


Smile

by CrimsonWaterlily



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Background Relationships, Bucky Barnes & Sam Wilson Friendship, Character Death, Dark fic, Depression, Dora Milaje - Freeform, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Hurt Bucky Barnes, Hurt Sam Wilson, Hurt Steve Rogers, Hurt T'Challa, Hurt/Comfort, Jewish Bucky Barnes, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Minor Clint Barton/Natasha Romanov, Minor James "Rhodey" Rhodes/Tony Stark, Nick Fury Knows All, Non-Graphic Rape/Non-Con, Past Riley/Sam Wilson, Polyamory Negotiations, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Racism, Sam Wilson is a Gift, Sexual Content, They're friends with benefits, Victim Blaming, everyone's going to get hurt at some point, nick loves cats, t'challa i'm so sorry
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-06-13
Updated: 2016-11-24
Packaged: 2018-07-14 17:43:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 7
Words: 45,304
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7183778
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CrimsonWaterlily/pseuds/CrimsonWaterlily
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Based on Jessica Jones TV series</p><p>After going through some traumatic events Bucky Barnes was just trying to make a living as a PI as well as trying not to be such a shitty friend. He was doing well, all things considered, until Steve Rogers came along and asked him to take a case. The case ends up bringing back demons he tried to bury, as well as an actual demon who's vent on terrorizing him. </p><p>Now Bucky has to work alongside the Avengers, a group of superheroes, to stop this monster. Unfortuntely he knows he's not a hero, he knows he's shit. Steve and Sam, along with everyone else will just have to remind him that he can be more than that.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Based on Jessica Jones, so you know this is gonna be dark, I'll add tags as I see fit. 
> 
> Warnings for chapter: non-consensual touching, flashbacks of sexual abuse and mentions/threats of sexual abuse.
> 
> Please send kudos and comments and happy readings!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We get to see a day in Bucky's shitty life.

It was a nice quiet day in the street; the bar bustled with people. Inside Sam Wilson served everyone their drinks with joy. He knew almost everyone here and they weren’t the kind of scum that frequented other bars. Nobody here was into criminal activities, at least none that involved hurting others without a good reason. It was here where neither he nor his coworkers were disrespected for their race/ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, etc. Any asshole that tried to get away with any of that shit got treated to an ex military’s punches.  


Sure, maybe this bar wasn’t what he’d always dreamed about ever since he was a kid, but it was a good place and he was damn proud of it.  


“Hey Wilson!” one of his customers at the bar called, “Another round will ya!”  


“John haven’t you had enough?” he scolded the elder man.  


“I’ll have enough once I’m dead in the gutter,” the older man grunted.  


“That’s reassuring,” Sam muttered pouring the man another.  


“So what’s going on with the other business?” the man slurred.  


“Oh my coworker’s handling it,” Sam replied.  


“You mean-?”  


“I _mean_ he’s handling it.”  


Sam was proud of how sure he was when he said that, he remembered a bet he’d made with John a while back, the deadline was near and he was willing to collect on that bet.  


There was a crash upstairs.  


He winced when he heard that. Damn that son of a bitch.  


John’s eyes were upstairs then he turned to Sam, with a thoughtful frown, “Looks like I get free drinks for a week.”  


Sam forced a smile when he heard another crash along with yelling before he sighed in resignation.  


The bet involved his partner not hitting one of his clients in their other business. He couldn’t be too mad, they usually had it coming, but damn it Barnes!  


~~~~~  


Upstairs Bucky Barnes had just about enough of the man’s struggling so he smashed him through the door window, knocking away the sign that read Canary Investigations which Sam had gone through a lot of trouble to get. The guy was definitely not gonna be happy, but fuck if Bucky cared.  


“Oh yeah and regarding your bill,” he muttered angrily at the man sprawled on the floor.  


~~~~~  


A while later Bucky walked down to the bar, tossing his unconscious client on top of a few garbage cans. He took more money than he should from the guy’s wallet, but the asshole had it coming.  


“Sup!” he called to Sam once he entered the bar, waving to John as he passed.  


“You just cost me 2000 dollars for the next week, at _least_ ,” Sam complained.  


“Here,” Bucky put some cash on the counter; only a rich asshole would carry that much money. “Throw my shit in there as well.”  


Sam rolled his eyes before handing the man a whiskey and a bottle, “One of these days you have to stop throwing clients, who are _senators_ , around, and stop making me give you drinks.”  


“Your business relies on alcohol consumption, deal with it. As for that guy he didn’t like the way I handle things,” Bucky muttered taking a shot then poured himself another.  


“Did you have to go all crazy on him? Cause’ he looks pretty beaten up and I don’t think he’s going to forget about it, again he’s the _senator_.”  


“He wanted to pay me to rape his wife,” Bucky glared.  


“Oh…never mind,” Sam said, no longer irritated about the ordeal. “But, what if he pays someone else?”  


“Don’t give a fuck,” Bucky replied taking another shot but noticed how Sam smirked knowingly at him.  


The look made Bucky glare and snap, “What?”  


“Don’t glare at me like that; I know you have a heart of gold.” Sam smirked then walked away to attend his other customers, leaving Bucky to roll his eyes.  


He just wanted to punch the fucker in the face but he knew what he said was true. He found out the woman had been having an affair with another woman. He didn’t know what prompted him to do so, but he met up with her and they both explained everything. Apparently she had only married the man because of her parents denying she was into women. Now she had fallen in love with the other woman and was planning to leave him without causing too much trouble.  


In the end he ended up taking pity on her and told her he would still have to give her husband the pictures, but promised he would try to smooth things over with him. She had been grateful for that and hoped her husband wouldn’t be too angry; she hadn’t known how much of a sadist he truly was.  


He tried to convince the man to take the easy way out but when the guy sprung that idea for Bucky, he fucked up badly. He didn’t even bother to use his right arm, he just started swinging with his left, which happened to be made of metal. Needless to say the man was going to complain. Luckily Bucky had looked the man up prior to working with him and now had more dirt on him than her. He already had a file ready for the woman to use against him, a file he was more than glad to share with director Nick Fury.  


Fury had been the one to recommend him to the senator, and Bucky was pretty sure the man had seen this coming. That’s how most of the cases Fury recommended him for went. Damn his fucking soft spot, it always got him roped into Fury’s game. He wasn’t really complaining, though, Fury always had a good goal in mind.  


The only irritating part was having the asshole rub his softness in his face.  


He drank another shot, preparing to down the entire bottle so that he wouldn’t have to deal with the bullshit this night.  


“Hey look it’s those Avengers guys,” one of the men at the bar called pointing to the screen.  


Bucky’s gazed darted to the TV and saw yet another save from the Avengers, the superheroes who went around saving people. This time they managed to stop a neo-Nazi group from levelling a city. There were several images being played, some of Iron Man and War Machine flying people out of the building, some of Hawkeye shooting things from the outside, the image then cut to Black Widow and Captain America exiting the building, and finally it showed the Captain America being hugged by a little girl in gratitude. He saw the image of her being patted over her curly hair and he felt something tug at his heart when the guy smiled at her before leaving.  


He vaguely wondered what that felt like, to have someone look up to you the way she looked up to the guy. He wondered what it was like to get to do something good without hesitation, instead of being an asshole that worked in the shadows and only did shit to get paid.  


He darted his gaze away, a voice in his head telling him he could never be like them.  


He pushed his glass away and settled for drinking from the bottle.  


Sam had seen the man stare at the screen and now watched him drink away, as usual, with a sad smile before he went back to cleaning. Before he knew it the night was over and Bucky was gone without speaking to him. He went to where the man had sat and picked up the extra tip he always left.  


How much longer was Bucky going to be like that? How long before he stopped talking to Sam altogether?  


He knew he couldn’t keep Bucky away from alcohol; hell one bottle barely did anything to him, so why bother? But he also knew he couldn’t bear to see the man drink himself away every night. The only reason he let him drink at the bar was because the last few times he had denied him drinks Bucky got angry, stormed off somewhere else and had come back home covered in bruises and blood, only some of it his. It broke his heart, so he let the guy drink, otherwise that might end up being another person he lost.  


“Later Sam!” his last customer called.  


“Later!”  


Once the bar was clean and empty Sam went to the bar, poured himself a glass of water, and took out a picture of him with another man. It read: “For the cutest boyfriend” – from the other cutest boyfriend, Riley.  


“264 days since my last drink,” Sam toasted, drinking the water before he got a solemn look, “How the hell did _you_ do it?”  


Another man would give up on someone they cared about if that person didn’t want any help, but Riley hadn’t given up on him when they were together, and neither had Bucky when he relapsed after Riley died. Now it was Sam’s turn to not give up on him.  


It was hard, but Riley gave him strength.  


He took out his phone and sent a text to Bucky then headed toward his place.  


~~~~~  


Bucky currently sat in his apartment, uncaring if the door was broken, and gave his arm some maintenance. He tweaked around with the wiring for a while, wincing every now and then when his nerves got shocked. After that was done he adjusted the plates and went back to drinking, gazing at a notebook in front of him.  


He eyed it with a blank stare but sorrowful eyes as he started writing in it, it wasn’t the best thing for him but at least he had alcohol to help him through.  


Once he had enough Bucky checked his phone when he received a text from Sam, it read: _Good night asshole, see you tomorrow maybe? Let’s do lunch._  


He groaned at the stupid text and replied: _you dont fucking DO lunch you EAT lunch + you need to start writing like a fucking millennial!_  


It didn’t take long to get a reply  


_ok it min yes?!_  


He rolled his eyes but couldn’t help a smile; he honestly didn’t know how millennials wrote he just knew they didn’t have perfect grammar like Sam did.  


_ill call u if im free_  


With that he put the phone away and went to his bed, where he froze. He hated sleeping on the bed; it was too soft, too warm. A long time ago he would’ve given anything to sleep on a bed, but now it brought too many memories. It was fine though, he had alcohol to help him sleep.  


He finished drinking another bottle, his fourth that night; he hated how it burned out so quickly with his metabolism so he drank way more to be able to feel the effects of being drunk. After he let the bottle clatter somewhere he lay on the bed, waiting for the alcohol take effect.  


Suddenly he felt it.  


_A hand ran through his hair and a tongue over his cheek._  


He sprung out of the bed swinging at the entity but found that he was alone in his apartment, he was safe, he wasn’t there with him.  


He breathed harshly as he ran his hands through his hair, he began to take long deep breaths then started singing.  


_"Shlof shoyn mayn tayer faygele_  
_Makh shoyn tsu dayn kosher aygelekh_  
_Shlof shoyn shlof_  
_In ziser ruh_  
_Aaaaai lu lu lu lu lu lu"_  


He didn’t sleep well that night, he never slept well anymore, at best he passed out, but that was good because it meant he didn’t dream again.  


~~~~~  


He woke up groggily and with a headache as usual and groaned when he sat up while his mouth felt ash dry.  


He jumped in shock and felt pain in his head when he heard the damn clock beeping. He fumbled around on his nightstand, knocking over bottles until he found the alarm clock and smashed it. He groaned at his action and flopped down on the bed while rubbing his head; great, another thing he would have to replace.  


He got up wearily and headed toward his kitchen to drink some water, then searched around his fridge looking for something to eat, preferably something that wasn’t expired. He settled for eating some toast since everything else smelled like shit.  


He took out his favorite morning drink which turned out to be a beer; if you drink it in the morning it’s a _morning_ drink, fuck you Sam!  


Once he finished his breakfast he went to get his stuff so he could meet the lady with the asshole senator husband. He found someone sitting in the living room when he neared the place.  


“Wanda?!” he yelled loudly snapping the girl awake.  


The teenager jumped in shock and rubbed her eyes wearily before her gaze landed on him.  


“Bucky?” she mumbled, “What are you doing in my apartment?”  


“This is my apartment moron,” he deadpanned, he was too tired for this.  


She frowned at that and looked around the place in confusion before she rubbed her head, and muttered, “You need to fix your door.”  


“I know dumbass,” Bucky growled then dragged her up by the arm, guiding her to her apartment. She stumbled around thanks to her drug-induced trance but he kept a firm hold of her. Before he dragged her out of his apartment, he grabbed the spare key he had for hers then went to the girl’s door.  


“Come on,” he muttered, annoyed by her but still being as gentle as he could. Once he opened the door he carried her inside and set her down on the bed before covering her up with some blankets.  


“Fucking junkie,” he muttered before he left the place and closed the door behind him.  


He sighed once he was outside, he hated having to deal with her but it wasn’t like he could leave her to fend for herself. She had lost her brother in an accident, which prompted her to start doing drugs. Junkie, young and Romani, she would be going through hell if he didn’t look out for her.  


It wasn’t that he liked her, he just felt bad for her. Plus, she was still a kid; he didn’t blame her for what led her to be a drug addict.  


~~~~~  


After giving his arm another maintenance, he headed out to where he met with his client’s wife the day before, file in hand for her to use against that piece of shit.  


He knocked twice on the door and waited for her to open; when she did she was surprised to see him but once that wore off she was relieved.  


“Mr. Barnes, how did it go?” she asked, looking hopeful.  


“Your husband is a piece of shit,” he grunted as he bypassed her and stepped into the hotel room, ignoring her expression.  


“I’m sorry?” she asked following him inside.  


“Hello there,” the woman’s girlfriend greeted him with a smile which he ignored in favor of placing the file on a nearby table.  


“Here’s the dirt on your husband, this will make you take all of his money which I highly suggest you do.”  


The two women were surprised they looked at each other in confusion before looking back to him, the wife asking, “Why-?”  


“He’s a shithead that’s all you need to know,” he answered quickly, not wanting to deal with this anymore.  


“Oh my God!” the girlfriend said looking over the files. “You’re just giving these to us?”  


The wife went to inspect them, Bucky nearly groaned; he just wanted to leave and get it to Fury already. The sooner he finished a job the sooner he could go home and get drunk.  


“This is…” the wife began to say but couldn’t. “How can we ever repay you?”  


“Well I could use some money.”  


He hadn’t meant for that to sound impatient, and frankly shitty, but the women didn’t seem to mind, they actually seemed happy to help him.  


“Let me see,” the wife said while she dug around her purse then produced her checkbook. “Will this be enough?”  


He eyed the check; it seemed generous so he shrugged.  


“Oh honey, add another zero,” the girlfriend said looking at her phone. “It says here that a good private investigator gets paid more than that.”  


“Oh of course,” the woman said.  


Bucky licked his lips and looked away when he saw the woman look for a pen to give him more money. She must think it was worth giving him more money, but she was wrong. He felt something tug at his gut when she handed him the check but took it anyways. He was not expecting her to hug him afterwards, it made his stomach flip and his muscles tense.  


“Thank you so much,” the woman said.  


“Yeah sure,” he muttered, gently pushing her away. “Just recommend me or whatever.”  


He was waved off by the women with smiles; they shouldn’t have to thank him, no one should.  


He headed toward Fury's work, trying to ignore his useless feelings.  


~~~~~  


He found himself entering the SHIELD building; there he swiped his fake ID through every security door. Almost everyone who worked at the building knew who he was and that his ID was fake, but he only had one route and that was Fury’s office, so long as he didn’t stray from it Fury made sure they minded their business. No one even paid attention to how the metal detectors constantly beeped anymore.  


“Hello Mr. Barnes,” Maria greeted him as he walked through the waiting room. “Are you here to see Mr. Fury?”  


“Yeah.”  


“Do you have an appointment?”  


“Yeah.”  


“Are you lying?”  


“Yeah.”  


He made his way toward director Fury’s office and entered without even knocking.  


“Sup Fury,” he called, approaching the older man.  


“How many times have I told you to knock?” Fury asked without even looking up from his papers.  


“A lot of times but I don’t feel like counting,” Bucky replied, dumping the file on the man’s desk, finally making him look up but looking utterly unsurprised.  


“All the dirt you could want from the senator,” Bucky continued, sitting down in front of him.  


“And why would I want that?” Fury asked, feigning innocence.  


Bucky gave him a lat stare, “Don’t play this game right now; I’m really not in the mood.”  


“Somebody forgot their morning drink?” Fury mocked, keeping his face neutral while he took the file without taking his eye off Bucky. Bucky in turn rolled his eyes and looked away as the man put the file in his drawer.  


“You got something for me?” he asked with an exasperated sigh.  


“Not at the moment.”  


“Yeah you do, you always have something for me.”  


“What’s the matter, don’t have enough booze?”  


“I have lots of booze especially with the check these women gave me.”  


“So you took money from them?”  


“Yeah, so what?”  


Fury sighed at that, “I know you well enough that you didn’t want that money, you just want another excuse to make yourself feel like shit.”  


“Enough with the psycho analysis, you got a job for me or not?”  


“Perhaps not, mostly because I don’t want you using your methods any time soon.”  


Bucky offered him a tight lipped smile, “You _love_ my methods, they get you results and they’re amusing to you.”  


“This is true but sometimes they give me paperwork, and I hate paperwork. Unless you want to finish it for me I suggest you leave.”  


That should’ve been the end of that, Fury went back to ignoring his presence and finishing his reports, but Bucky was determined to get a case. He didn’t want to have to force the guy, but he left him no choice. Now he would have to deal with the consequences.  


He dug around in his pack and placed something on the man’s desk, finally getting the guy’s attention.  


“I hate you,” Fury commented, eyeing the small kitten on his desk.  


Bucky smirked in triumph; if there was one thing that Fury loved, it was cats, especially one who looked as dirty and skinny as this one.  


“Found him in an alley, poor guy’s mom was lying dead just next to him and he was curled up to her.”  


Fury eyed the cat then glared at Bucky, moving to pick up it up without breaking eye contact and placing it inside another drawer where the little guy started gobbling up some cat food Fury kept there.  


All throughout that Fury kept glaring at Bucky, wishing to wipe the smirk off the guy’s face for preying on his weakness.  


“You want a case that badly?”  


Bucky’s smirk finally vanished as he sighed, sagging his shoulders. This made Fury’s gaze finally soften, or at least ease up on the glare. Bucky was no longer confident or angry, he was the same self-loathing man he always was.  


“I just need something to occupy myself with, otherwise I’ll go insane…” Bucky mumbled, only looking down at his hands.  


“That’s why I keep telling you to go to the psychiatrist.”  


Bucky rolled his eyes, “A fucking psychiatrist who’s gonna keep telling me to sing a verse of an old lullaby whenever I have panic attacks or tell me to write my memories in a notebook? No thanks, I don’t feel like throwing my money down the drain.”  


Fury eyed the man for a moment but eventually sighed.  


“One of these days the kitten stunt won’t work.”  


“Thank you Nick,” Bucky said all too sweetly. “So what do you need?”  


“There’s an FBI agent who’s been known for criminal activities, but we haven’t been able to find any solid evidence to suspend him indefinitely or put him in jail. We’ve been forced to drop the case, and because he’s a top agent that has filed many complaints about SHIELD _harassing_ him, no one’s allowed to investigate him further.”  


“So you want me to spy on him and catch him in the act, without making it look like it was you who sent me.”  


“And by any chance,” Fury continued dumping a book in front of him. “This is something _personal_ of his. Drop it off for me.”  


“Aww Nick, you want me to drop his diary off,” Bucky cooed, getting the hint.  


“Now get the fuck out,” Fury glared to which Bucky waved happily before leaving.  


He wondered what shit the guy had done that would make Fury want him to catch him in the act. That was one of the reasons he loved working with Fury, sure the guy did a lot of dirty stuff himself and was an A+ bullshitter, but it was always for a good reason.  


Bucky might hate himself, but that didn’t mean he hated the people agents like these put in harm’s way.  


~~~~~  


When he got home he found Sam already there, looking smug as hell which made Bucky roll his eyes.  


“I knew you were bullshitting when you said you’d do lunch,” Sam explained.  


“I said I would call you if I was free, and for fuck’s sake you _eat_ lunch,” Bucky argued.  


“Whatever, are you free?”  


Bucky thought for a moment, unable to form the words to turn him down, “I just have this case that I-.”  


“Sweet, tell me about it on the way.”  


Bucky rolled his eyes and proceeded to follow Sam, unknowing where the guy was taking him. It later turned out they were going to the grocery store to get him some food. Well he couldn’t complain too much, especially not when Sam put some plums in the shopping cart; Bucky loved plums.  


“Is there a reason for this?” Bucky asked.  


“I figured you wanted to eat something other than worms,” Sam replied.  


“There were worms?”  


“Yeah in a purple bowl.”  


“Oh shit, I thought that was rice,” Bucky muttered, scrunching his nose.  


Thankfully he hadn’t eaten that.  


“Plus, this is a way for you to treat me to a lot of things,” Sam continued, showing Bucky boxes of his favorite treats.  


Bucky rolled his eyes, but smiled.  


He couldn’t say he didn’t miss these moments with Sam, despite the anxiety and guilt he always felt whenever he was near him. He just couldn’t stay away; he was Sam’s anchor as much as Sam’s was his, especially with the anniversary coming up.  


Sam and Riley’s anniversary was tomorrow, and here he was working a case.  


“How are you still my friend?” Bucky asked.  


Sam was silent for a moment, looking away with a thoughtful frown, “You know I always asked myself how Riley was still my boyfriend. I guess he was stupid, some of it must’ve rubbed off on me.”  


Bucky smiled gratefully; yeah he wasn’t the only stupid one.  


“You don’t have to come tomorrow, but…” Sam muttered in a shaky voice, “It’ll make me feel less miserable.”  


Bucky could only smile in sympathy, “I need to work this case, I’ll try to get it done by tomorrow.”  


Sam smiled gratefully and the two went back to shopping.  


~~~~~  


The next day after following the FBI agent, Grant Ward, for who knows how long, he tracked him down to a club from where he exited out the back to where his car was parked. There he saw what looked like a very unconscious girl in his arms then being placed in the trunk.  


Well now he had something on him.  


He followed him for a few minutes jumping from the rooftops until he finally met him at a stoplight, “Excuse me sir!” he called going over to the side of his car. “Could you tell where Sixteenth and Broadway is?”  


“It’s called Google Maps, asshole!” the guy said, before the light turned green and he started driving off, or at least that’s what he tried to do. Bucky looked at the sky with a frown by the looks of things it seemed like it was going to rain soon; damn, he should’ve brought an umbrella.  


“What the fuck?!”  


His eyes snapped back to guy yelling as he tried to accelerate and drive off; right, job.  


He smiled in amusement as the wheels kept moving while he held the back of the car in mid-air with his metal arm.  


“Ah shit you’re one of them!” Ward yelled then killing the engine, taking his seatbelt off and going for the door. Bucky put the car down and headed over to his side where he closed the door for him, and kept on doing so when the guy tried to get it open again.  


“Stay away from me, please!” the guy said fearfully.  


Bucky eyed him with dark squinty eyes and a clenched jaw, “I bet that girl in your trunk would say the same thing if she were conscious. What’d you do, spice up her drink?”  


“If you hurt me, I’ll tell the whole world about you! There’ll be nowhere to hide!”  


“Pal, I’ve been hiding for years, you think your description of a random white man is gonna do anything? Plus, let’s face it, that woman back there isn’t gonna help your chances.”  


Bucky opened the car door and took the man’s keys from his trembling hands, then reached down to open the trunk. After that he yanked the guy out and threw him to the ground, where he tried to crawl away. Bucky ignored him and proceeded to flatten his tire with his hand. He turned back to Ward and saw him get up and run away, Bucky didn’t take long to reach him and yank him back to the car where he slammed him into the side.  


The man groaned in pain but Bucky paid him no attention as he took his phone out, “Yes hello 911, there’s a man with a woman in his trunk here at Lincoln Avenue, close to King’s street…yes…I was going to help him with a flat tire.” Ward pulled a gun on him but Bucky covered it with his left hand, letting the bullet ricochet in his palm while silencing it, and then pulled the gun away. “Yeah when he opened the trunk to get something I said I would help, then he tried to push me away and that’s when I saw the woman there…Any other witnesses?”  


“Me,” he almost jumped at hearing a voice next to him, he turned in surprise to see a blond man standing there, smiling in amusement at the man who tried to get up. This time it was the blond who slammed him to the car.  


“Yeah there’s another guy here,” Bucky said, watching in curiosity as the blonde held the agent to the door. “Yeah, the girl’s alright…ok thanks, we’ll be here waiting.”  


He hung up the phone and looked at the blonde, not able to believe his eyes when he got a good look at him.  


“Steven Rogers, call me Steve,” Captain _freaking_ America greeted while offering a hand.  


Bucky looked at him, showing only mild surprise when he took the offered hand.  


“That’s quite a bullet catch you did there,” the walking American flag commented, much to Bucky’s annoyance.  


“Yeah well, perks of having a metal arm and super strength.”  


“Metal arm?” Steve asked, “That’s pretty cool.”  


Bucky shrugged, it wasn’t as cool when he lost it but having it _was_ pretty cool and he wasn't afraid to be proud of it.  


“I’m glad you were here,” Steve commented. “Thanks to you, that girl is safe.”  


Bucky looked away, breathing through his nose, “Yeah well don’t think I did it for her in particular.”  


Steve nodded in understanding and then frowned at him curiously while keeping an eye on Ward who continued to moan in pain, “So, you didn’t tell me your name.”  


“Clark Smith,” Bucky lied expertly, he already had a cover for the police to get a testimony.  


“Ok…are you lying?”  


Bucky sent the man a glare to which he raised his arms in surrender, “Sorry I asked.”  


They went back to being silent but Bucky continued to glare at him until the police arrived.  


They took the girl to the hospital and called her parents. They would make sure to put the guy away with both the kidnapping and with the notebook evidence Bucky had planted in his car.  


Once he was about to leave the station he found Steve waiting at the doorway, “I have an umbrella,” he said. “I noticed you don’t.”  


Bucky resumed glaring at him but rolled his eyes and exited the station, vent on leaving the guy behind. He received no such luck as the man chased him until he covered them both with the umbrella.  


“What you plan on following me, Mr. America?” Bucky asked.  


“Sure, I just want to make sure you get where you need to safely.”  


“I’m perfectly capable of handling myself.”  


“I know, that’s just an excuse to walk with you.”  


Bucky rolled his eyes at that, “So what makes you think I’m lying about my name?”  


“The fact that you work for Nick Fury.”  


“Oh right, he knows you people.”  


Steve chuckled, “Yeah, are you the guy who bribes him with cats?”  


“Of course, Fury loves cats.”  


“That he does.”  


“So what, were you following me?”  


“Not really, I just stumbled upon you.”  


“Then un-stumble upon me.”  


Steve laughed holding his head low and Bucky could see a clear blush on his face.  


“That’s really not something I can do.”  


“Why’s that?”  


“Because I wanted to ask you out tonight.”  


Bucky stopped dead in his tracks and narrowed his eyes at him while smiling in amusement, “Captain, do you seriously want to go out with me?”  


“Is there something wrong with that?”  


Bucky gave him a sideways glance while holding his fake smile in place, “No, I just think that’s a little forward for someone like you, plus I kind of have plans tonight.”  


Steve nodded in understanding, “Some other time then?”  


Bucky was silent for a moment, looking at Steve his mind reminded him of another blond, one whose presence revolted him.  


He shook his head, trying to will those memories away and cleared his throat before responding, “No thank you.”  


With that he started walking away, uncaring if he got wet; he just didn’t want to be near the guy anymore. Besides, he had someone else to meet tonight, someone who would still tolerate him after dealing with his shitty self. He highly doubted even Captain America would want to stick around with him, after all he was shit.  


Steve watched him walk away with an amused smile.  


~~~~~  


Bucky knocked on Sam’s door, completely drenched but still there, it was the least he could do for Sam. So when Sam opened the door, he ignored how his mind told him he was shit because he wasn’t doing this for Sam.  


“Hey man,” Sam said looking him over. “You’re soaking wet.”  


Bucky ignored the obvious and greeted him with a smile while holding up a bottle, receiving a sideways glare from Sam. “It’s apple cider,” he explained.  


Sam shrugged in approval and took the bottle, opening the door to let him in.  


“I’m gonna go and take a bath,” Bucky exclaimed, taking his jacket and shirt off. “You’re welcome to join me.”  


When he said that he turned to Sam, showing his abs and taking off his pants, making Sam laugh in amusement, “Seriously?!”  


“What? Riley loved this,” Bucky shrugged going over to Sam and kissing him.  


Sam laughed through the kiss but kissed back, running his hands up Bucky’s chest while Bucky ran his over his hips, grasping at his buttocks. Once they parted Bucky looked him in the eye and whispered huskily, “I’m gonna go into the bath and if you’re not there I’m gonna jerk off by myself and shove my metal fingers into my ass.”  


That caused Sam to laugh, covering his face with his hands. Bucky smiled at that and went to the bathroom.  


The thing about Riley was that he enjoyed masturbating to Sam and Bucky having sex, and he didn't mind his boyfriend sleeping with someone else.  


He knew what Riley liked as well, to have Bucky buried deep into Sam as they came together.  


A while later that’s exactly what was happening, they knelt inside the tub while Bucky pressed Sam against the wall, luckily there was padding on the floor.  


Sam moaned loudly as he braced himself against the bathroom wall, Bucky behind him pounding into his lubed up ass, grasping the man’s waist in a bruising grip as he dug his cock in and out of him, Sam’s moans driving him.  


“Oh fuck!” Sam gasped, “Oh faster!”  


Bucky was happy to oblige, biting at Sam’s neck as he picked up the pace, striking Sam’s prostate while the man clenched around his shaft. He began to stroke Sam’s arousal, steadying himself with his metal arm.  


“Can’t forget about this, can we?” Bucky laughed when Sam’s noises got louder when he stroked the member, feeling the pre-cum coating it.  


He moved faster feeling Sam’s ass clench and on one last harsh thrust he buried himself deeply feeling himself come along with Sam.  


The two groaned in pleasure before gasping when they rode of their orgasms and slumped against the wall.  


“That one’s for you Riley!” Bucky yelled, slumping his head against Sam who laughed.  


“Gosh I love your tuchus,” Bucky groaned, giving the guy’s ass a smack making the other yelped.  


“Motherfucker!” Sam yelled as the two laughed and went to relax on opposite sides of the tub.  


“So may I ask, why you decided to have sex with me for the first time in forever?” Sam asked.  


Bucky sighed; he figured he would receive that question. The truth was that there were a lot of reasons why he decided to do this. He felt like shit, he wanted to forget about shit, he kept doing shitty stuff…he also knew he was a shitty friend, because he did it to erase the memories. Basically he did it because _he_ was shit.  


He shrugged, and thought of something else to tell Sam, “I guess it would’ve been an amazing anniversary present.”  


Sam didn’t buy it for one minute, but he said nothing about it. He may love Bucky but he didn’t want to push him, no matter how much he missed him.  


“…Please stop being so distant with me,” Sam muttered in a shaky voice, not looking at him. “I need you Barnes, please don’t quit on me.”  


Bucky didn’t look at him, he couldn’t.  


He wanted to tell Sam so badly, but he knew if he did he would probably lose him forever. He may not have the courage to be the friend he used to be, but he also didn’t have the courage to completely cut him off. Sam needed him, even if he was shit.  


“I’ll try,” he whispered.  


Sam smiled; it was a start.  


~~~~~  


Aneka kept her eyes on her charge at all times, Prince T’Challa told her to enjoy herself but he knew she wouldn’t do that. Her idea of a good time differed from his; a good time for her involved someone to spar with, or being with Ayo, or simply doing the job she was so proud of.  


Okoye and Nareema sat next to her, on guard in case their prince came under harm. He had wanted to experience the American dance club life that Tony Stark had described to him, and was enjoying himself chatting with a few women despite the loud music. The girls seemed to have other ideas than him though; she had to admit it was amusing to see him talk about things they didn’t understand. He enjoyed talking about science and technology, the Americans at these particular places didn’t share the same interests.  


Still he seemed to be enjoying himself so the Dora Milaje would stand by while he did, ready to protect their prince with everything they had.  


Unfortunately even with all their training, even if they were considered the strongest warriors in the world, they could not have prepared for what would happen.  


“Excuse me ladies,” they heard a man speak and vaguely acknowledged him.  


“You will allow your charge to escape in the crowd.”  


Suddenly that was Aneka’s only objective in mind, despite the fact that a voice at the back of her head said not to listen to it. She had a desperate need to do just that, Okoye and Nareema felt the same.  


“Of course we will,” she and the other two said without further thought.  


“And you will forget about me,” he continued.  


“We will forget you,” they replied.  


Their goals were clear, and there would be nothing stopping them from carrying them out.  


They instantly forgot about the man and only waited to let their prince escape in the crowd.  


The man was satisfied with their replies and he casually strolled toward the prince, once he reached him he spoke to the girls, “Ladies, all of you leave.”  


They did so without hesitation, leaving T’Challa in confusion. He glared at the man suspiciously for being so disrespectful.  


“And who might you be?” he demanded.  


“You want to come with me,” the man ordered.  


T’Challa almost scoffed in amusement but it soon that emotion vanished, all that followed was an unquenchable need to do as this man asked.  


“I sure do,” he replied.  


“This way then,” the man gestured and T’Challa followed; right now it was the only thing he wanted. He ignored something tugging at the back of his mind, something that screamed at him that he didn’t want this; he didn’t want to go with this man. He would ignore it, because of course he wanted to.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The verse of the lullaby Bucky's singing is from [here](https://yiddishlyrics.wordpress.com/tag/lullaby/)
> 
> Tuchus is a Yiddish euphemism for ass
> 
> look me up: [tumblr](http://crimson-waterlily.tumblr.com/)


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bucky and Sam meet the Avengers and Bucky gets a case from an unlikely person.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was hell to write, and I had to divide it into two because honestly it was getting to be too long, I'll post the next one shortly. Enjoy!
> 
> Warnings: brief flashback of non-consensual touching.

The next few days were extremely boring and uneventful, much to Bucky’s annoyance. The only new thing that occurred was that he finally decided to start seeing Sam every night, mostly because Sam sent him nude pictures which Bucky masturbated to but weren’t enough to satisfy him. Other than that Fury had given him no other missions, he said he had more pressing matters and had kicked him out of the office. Bucky figured it was something very important, he had shown up with a cat and the asshole kept it but didn’t give him a case! Well, he was right: one of these days the kitten approach wouldn’t work.

That just left him hoping for other people to call him, but so far it was just two people who wanted pictures of their cheating spouses. Those cases were hilariously easy and quick, so all that was left was waiting.

He hated waiting. It always reminded him of how he had to wait for hours in bed, naked and soaked in his urine.

He shook his head when those thoughts came back and he stumbled to get a drink, finding Wanda in his kitchen.

“Wanda this isn’t your apartment,” he muttered tiredly.

“Hm,” she mumbled looking at him in confusion, but not really seeing him.

“Let’s go,” he said, taking her hand and dragging her back to her own apartment. He made sure to get a sweater and his glove to keep the arm out of sight; he still wasn’t too comfortable with people seeing it, plus it would be easy for someone to recognize.

Once he set her to bed again and exited the place he was met by voice calling, “I think I give that girl a few months before she overdoses.”

He rolled his eyes when he saw Jack Thompson down the hall, the guy was 50% hot looks but 150% asshole. 

“Well excuse me for not taking that into account when leading her into her apartment when she’s like that,” he replied with a scowl.

“I’m just saying-.”

“Well fuck you for saying!” Bucky snapped then strode back to his apartment. He hated the guy for many reasons but one of them was that he always gave Wanda shit whenever she was like this. It didn’t matter if Wanda was a junkie; he had no right to yell at a lady whenever she accidentally stumbled into his apartment.

“Look I’m sorry,” Jack called running to catch up to him. “How about I take you out somewhere?”

“Not the least bit interested,” Bucky replied then closed the door in the guy’s face. The cardboards over the door were a poor excuse for keeping the guy out but they made the point clear.

He went to the kitchen, taking out a drink from the fridge to forget about the asshole ruining his morning, but after a few minutes he heard a knock and the door open. He rolled his eyes and placed the drink back in the fridge before stomping toward it, “Jack I told you I do-!”

He stopped talking when he reached the hall and saw none other than Steve.

Steve looked like a deer caught in the headlights, his hand hovering over the door, “Sorry, I knocked and it just opened.”

“Why are you here?” he asked with an exasperated sigh, ignoring his words. He was so not in the mood to have an Avenger following him home for whatever reason.

Steve bit his lip and avoided his gaze which made Bucky more curious than annoyed, the guy was slouching and his gaze seemed to be far off.

“Something wrong?” Bucky asked, raising an eyebrow at him when the guy snapped his attention back.

“It’s just that…” Steve began, pausing to take a deep breath, “Why do you take Fury’s cases?”

Bucky was a little thrown off by the question and briefly considered not answering, but seeing how tired the man looked, he figured there was no harm in going for a partial truth.

“I get good money,” he shrugged, noticing that Steve didn’t really like the answer so he rolled his eyes and continued, “…and I guess it’s a better way to use my _talents_ other than terrorizing people.”

That answered seemed to satisfy Steve since he gave Bucky a smile. 

Bucky looked down and away when he felt something twist in his stomach at seeing that smile, it _wasn't_ because it looked gorgeous.

“That’s good,” Steve continued, but Bucky didn’t turn back to him.

He headed toward the kitchen quickly, hoping that he wasn’t blushing, because for fuck’s sake it was just a smile, he should not be feeling this embarrassed.

“So you want anything?” Bucky asked.

“Actually I wanted to talk to you about something,” Steve called as he followed.

“What?” 

Bucky finally turned back to Steve, who only held an envelope out, Bucky eyed the thing in curiosity and suspicion before taking it gingerly. He opened it up and saw a bunch of 100 dollar bills in it. His eyes went back to Steve, narrowing his eyes in skepticism.

Steve only shrugged, taking the cash back from Bucky who waited for the explanation.

“This is only a handful of what you could get for a job I have for you. First, I’m gonna need you to come with me to your friend’s bar, from there we’ll go to Avenger’s tower to discuss things further.”

Bucky didn’t bother asking how he knew about Sam; the guy must’ve read his friend’s file. What surprised him was that he needed to go to the bar, then to the tower for a job _description_.

“And we can’t discuss things now, because…?” Bucky asked.

Steve’s mouth opened but said nothing, his hands dug into his pockets as he tried to find the right words, “This is a job that requires extreme discretion. I can’t give you any more details right now.”

“So the _Avengers_ , need a PI for something?”

Steve gave him a look, one that told Bucky he shouldn’t be making more jokes, “I wouldn’t ask this if it wasn’t absolutely important…please?”

Bucky eyed the man for a little while longer but eventually sighed and grabbed his jacket, “Fine, let’s go.”

Steve smiled in gratitude and followed Bucky toward the bar.

~~~~~

Sam was cleaning everything up at the bar; he always liked having everything ready for when he got back from the gym later. He was whistling a tune to himself as he set things up behind the bar when he heard the bell chime. 

“We’re not open yet!” he called.

“It’s me Sam.” Bucky announced.

“Oh hey pal,” Sam said, a smile in place then it disappeared and when he turned to look in surprise at Steve walking behind Bucky.

“Holy shit,” he whispered, much to Bucky’s amusement.

Bucky took a seat at the bar while Steve looked around the place, looking impressed. 

“Whiskey please,” Bucky said.

“It’s only noon,” Sam muttered, turning back to glare at Bucky.

“It’s happy hour somewhere,” Bucky muttered, making Sam roll his eyes and hand him a bottle.

“So, how did you meet Captain America?” Sam hissed.

“I didn’t, he just sort of wants to hire me,” Bucky answered.

“Should I offer him free drinks?” 

“No man, you gotta play it cool!”

“Okay,” Sam muttered as he waved at Steve Rogers. “Hi, Sam Wilson, call me Sam.”

“Steve Rogers, just Steve,” Steve said going over to shaking Sam’s hand. “Nice place you got here,” he commented.

“Thanks.”

“So I’m-,” Steve’s eyes darted to the bottle Bucky had uncorked. “It’s barely noon.”

“Happy hour somewhere,” Bucky shrugged with a smirk taking a long sip and gasping in satisfaction when it went down.

Steve was at loss for words but eventually shook it off and continued, “Anyways, I’m glad I could meet with you as well Sam.”

“So you want Sam too?” Bucky asked.

“Yes, this is a delicate matter, for which I require both of you.”

“But how-?” Sam began.

“I’ve read all about your time in the military, about your time as the Falcon.”

Bucky’s eyes went to Sam’s mid sip, waiting for a reaction from the guy.

Sam seemed to be stuttering for words but eventually he bowed his head and looked at his hands. That was a part of his life he didn’t usually touch, it wasn’t really worth touching anymore to him; it brought too many memories of Riley.

Steve smiled in reassurance, “You did an excellent job over there, a lot of people have you to thank.”

Sam said nothing, and looking at his hands and the way his chest moved Bucky saw that he was close to hyperventilating if this continued.

“Anyways,” Bucky interrupted, snapping Sam out of his thoughts before he had a panic attac. “Apparently he can’t say much about the job, he’ll tell us if we agree to go with him to Avengers tower.”

“Oh,” Sam mumbled clearing his throat, glad that Bucky had his back. “Can’t you tell us the basics?” he asked.

Steve looked thoughtful for a moment before sighing, “It has to do with a missing person.”

“Oh?” Bucky said, raising an eyebrow. “And the Avengers or the authorities can’t work on this case?”

“It’s a little complicated, which is why we need to talk somewhere private,” Steve explained.

Bucky studied the guy for a while, wondering why he would need them to do this. Sam on the other hand was internally debating with himself on this, he wasn’t sure how he could help; he hadn’t helped someone other than Bucky since Riley, and for that he wasn’t sure he could do it again.

“Are you offering me this as a chance to recruit me?” Bucky asked, suspicious. 

Steve gave a small laugh, “I wouldn’t dream of recruiting someone unless they were skilled and willing.”

Bucky smirked; well he had one down.

He drank another sip of whisky, “You don’t have to pay me that much,” he explained. “I only charge by the hour plus other expenses, just regular payment upfront.”

Steve emitted a small sigh of relief then turned to Sam, who was stunned when he set his eyes on him.

“I-I-I I’m not…” Sam stuttered but was stopped when Steve gave him a pleading look.

“Sam, this is important, we could really use your help, and we’ll pay you the same as Bucky.”

Sam’s mouth gaped as he turned to Bucky for help, Bucky just shrugged and continued drinking making Sam click his teeth in annoyance; no help there. He turned back to Steve and crap, he just had this puppy dog smile. This was Captain America with a puppy dog smile, how do you say no to that?

“Alright then,” he sighed, making Steve smile and nod in gratitude.

“Thank you, come on, I’ll take you.”

~~~~~

The ride to the tower was in a regular cab which Steve paid for, because Sam had no money and Bucky didn’t want to pay so he said he didn’t; Sam glared at him while Bucky shrugged.

When they reached the building Bucky had to admit he was impressed by all the technology they got a glimpse of during the elevator ride. The sight of it almost made him think back to his childhood; but that was a long time ago.

“Is this building nothing but technology stuff?” Sam asked once they reached a point where the doors no longer projected the outside in a sort of screen, instead they went back to regular doors.

“A few of the first floors are where the college students and graduates work, the middle floors are for restaurants, hotel rooms and banks, top floors are Tony’s private R&D and living spaces for the Avengers.”

“You live here?” Sam asked, as he looked out the back of the elevator to the rest of the buildings. “…Well who wouldn’t want to?”

Steve chuckled, rubbing the back of his head, “Yeah, it took Tony a while but he finally convinced me. All he had to do was bring me up here.”

Steve said this when they reached a higher place and saw the rest of New York. 

Bucky couldn’t deny that the sight was beautiful, but it just brought back unwanted memories. It was a different building, with a different sight, but it still felt familiar.

_He took Bucky’s hand in one hand and tipped his chin with the other, then he whispered, “This is where you wanted it, isn’t it? Now smile.”_

_He ignored Bucky’s tear and kissed his cheek when Bucky smiled._

He snapped his head away from the window and bit his lip while griping the handle bar with his flesh hand tightly, trying to keep the metal one in check. He only replayed the lullaby in his head this time; he didn’t want to voice it with Steve and Sam there. 

Sam noticed his discomfort but like always, he knew better than to pressure Bucky when he was like this. Steve noticed as well but said nothing; it wasn’t his place.

After a while they reached the last floor and once they stepped inside, following Steve, they were greeted by a friendly looking man or…robot? 

“Welcome back Captain Rogers,” the robot thing greeted with a small bow.

“Hey Vision.”

Sam and Bucky stood with confused frowns looking at the…cyborg?

“Guys this is Vision,” Steve explained. “He’s an android.”

Vision noticed their surprised looks and avoided their gaze, “I’m human for the most part,” he explained timidly. “But I can imagine I’m difficult to look at.”

“No, it’s just surprising at first glance,” Bucky explained. “I have a metal arm so, who am I to talk?”

“…I’m just weirded out by the British accent,” Sam said.

“This way then,” Vision said beckoning them to follow him and Steve.

“The accent is what weirds you out?” Bucky whispered, looking annoyed.

“British accents are weird for me,” Sam shrugged, making Bucky shake his head and roll his eyes in amusement.

They were led into a very large lounge, the bar was not far away and there were two levels to it, they were on the top one, overlooking the city.

Sam whistled looking at the place, “Nice.”

“You can sit here and wait,” Steve said. “I’ll be right back.”

They didn’t ask why he was leaving; they figured he was probably going to get a case file.

“In the meantime, may I offer you gentlemen something to drink?” Vision asked.

“No thank you,” Sam replied.

“Whiskey,” Bucky muttered.

“ _No_ , no whisky for him!” Sam quickly exclaimed.

Bucky clicked his teeth raising his hands in disbelief, muttering, “Come on man.”

“Very well then, if you need anything please don’t hesitate to call me.” 

After that Vision bowed and walked away, leaving the two friends alone.

“This is an amazing view,” Sam commented looking out the windows.

“I guess,” Bucky muttered, not wanting to look again.

“Ah so there you are!” they heard a woman’s call and turned to see a beautiful redheaded woman. 

“…Hi,” Sam said awkwardly, raising his hand.

“Natasha Romanoff,” she said, extending her hand toward them. “Pleasure to meet you.”

“Likewise,” Bucky said with a smirk and a wink. He was not fooled by her appearance; while she was beautiful she was also deadly and was capable of going up against him. He was also pretty sure she was assessing him and Sam through her friendly smile, her posture looked relaxed but he knew better than to fully trust a former Russian assassin. 

“Same here,” Sam said, shaking her hand.

“Hey Natasha, can I call you Natasha?” Bucky said, a fake smile in place.

“Sure, would like you me to call you Bucky, or James?”

Bucky looked at her with squinted eyes and a tight lipped smile; almost no one knew of his real name unless he had to present official documents. She was letting him know she had done her research on him and would no doubt take advantage of it should she have to, he had to congratulate her for being smart.

“You know on the other hand, do you prefer Natalia?” he asked.

Sam watched the interaction without knowing what to do, though he figured he didn’t want to get involved in their mind games so he stayed quiet.

Natasha on the other hand rewarded Bucky with a fake smile of her own; unfortunately for her, he could play this game too.

“Natasha is fine,” she replied. “Did you want to ask something?”

“Oh yes,” Bucky answered, remembering his initial question. “Can you tell me why there’s a man in the vent of that wall.” He pointed to the top corner of one of the walls.

“How’d you know I was here?!” they heard someone inside yelling.

“Clint, I can hear you chewing Tony’s doughnuts since I got in here,” Natasha said through an exasperated sigh. “I’m sure a detective can hear you as well.”

“Dang it! I was trying to get a feel of them from here!”

Sam and Bucky turned in confusion toward the man who popped the vent open and jumped down, with a box of doughnuts.

“Hello, Clint Barton,” he muffled through a bite, making the other two men frown in disgust and Natasha roll her eyes in amusement. He went closer to them as he spoke, “Avenger, loves arrows, Hawkeye _not_ Hot Guy but that works too sometimes…doughnut?”

He extended the box to them but they shook their heads in denial so he shrugged and went to wrap a hand around Natasha’s shoulder.

“So,” he continued as he finally stopped eating and set the box down. “You’re the guys Steve wants to hire?”

“Well technically he wants to hire Barnes here,” Sam explained. “I’m still not sure what I’m supposed to be doing.”

“Don’t you worry, Cap has a good reason for you to be here,” Clint assured Sam, then looked him up and down. “Besides being the eye candy.”

Sam was surprised at the statement but couldn’t say he was unpleased; Bucky was the offended one, apparently he wasn’t eye candy material as well.

“AHA!” another person shouted. Joining the group were the two metal suit guys, James Rhodes and Tony Stark.

“I knew you took my doughnuts-, hello!” Tony yelled pointing at Clint but his attention was quickly caught by Sam and Bucky.

“Ah you’re the guy Steve wanted to hire,” Rhodey said.

“Colonel James Rhodes, it’s a pleasure, my name’s Bucky,” Bucky said, this time it was genuine since he was about the only one of the four he trusted right now. Natasha was a spy, Tony was an eccentric billionaire and Clint was…weird; he wasn’t really one to talk but still.

“Please call me Rhodey,” Rhodey said then shook Sam’s hand. “Mr. Wilson.”

“Call me Sam,” Sam explained. “I gotta say it’s an honor meeting you, sir.”

“Not me?” Tony pouted.

Sam and Bucky weren’t scared to shake their faces with frowns, being respectively black and Jewish, rich white boys weren’t their favorite kind of people. 

“Figures,” Tony sighed to which Rhodey rolled his eyes.

“I’ve flown 138 missions which is way more than you, I’m sure they have good reasons to like me better.”

“Yeah but I’m the genius.”

“So? I got the beautiful thighs.”

“Your thighs _are_ gorgeous. But I got the beautiful face, oh who am I kidding neither of us have that anymore, we’re old.”

“Yeah.” Rhodey sighed.

Sam and Bucky watched the banter with amused grins. 

“Hey, you with the pretty hair,” Tony said pointing to Bucky. “I hear you have a metal arm.”

Bucky desperately resisted the urge to move his hand toward his arm; he didn’t particularly care when people, especially scientists, looked at it the way Tony was looking.

“I bet I could change your mind about not liking me if you let me tweak around with it, maybe install some lasers.”

There were collective groans, rolls of eyes and “Tony”s from the other Avengers, but Bucky put on his kindest smile before answering, “Touch my arm and I’ll snap your neck with it.”

Tony didn’t seem intimidated, much, but he raised his arms in surrender.

“Anyways,” Rhodey interjected. “I assume you guys haven’t met your client yet.” 

“…Aren’t you guys the client?” Sam asked.

“Not exactly,” Clint answered. “The client is on his way along with Steve.”

Right on cue the elevator dinged and two people stepped out of it, one of them was Steve and the other was…

Sam and Bucky’s eyes widened, they looked to each other then back at the man as he and Steve approached. Was it really him?

Steve looked at them all, “Oh good, you’re all here. That means we can get started, sir.” He gave curt nod to the older man accompanying him and gestured toward Sam and Bucky.

“Gentlemen I’m glad to meet your acquaintance,” the man said, stepping closer. “My name is T’Chaka, King of Wakanda.”

Sam and Bucky must’ve looked comical to them all because they could hear snickering but neither of them were able to make themselves say anything against it. They weren’t even able to process thoughts at the moment.

Bucky took a loud gulp and was the first to speak, his voice sounding choked as he gave a light bow, “Your highness.” 

He turned to Sam and saw he was still frozen so he thumped his arm to snap him out of his thoughts. Sam blinked at the action and greeted the man with a bow as well, “A pleasure to meet you your highness.” 

“Oh I don’t think you should be acting so modest Mr. Wilson,” T’Chaka said with a gentle smile. “You’ve had dealings with my son.”

Bucky frowned looking at Sam, “Wait what?”

“Um…” Sam muttered looking away and scratching the back of his neck.

“Mr. Wilson here once helped my son save a Wakandan ambassador,” T’Chaka explained. “She was being held captive along with other Americans.” 

“Oh really?” Bucky said with his fakest smile. “He’s never mentioned anything like that.”

Sam rubbed his neck, “I’m not supposed to talk about it.”

“Why?” 

“Because in gratitude the prince gave me experimental tech to test in the field, and I swore I wouldn’t let anyone know about it.”

Bucky reluctantly accepted the excuse and turned back to King T’Chaka when he spoke, “I’m the one who requested both of you for a job.”

Bucky raised his eyebrows in confusion, “You? King of _the_ most self-sufficient and technologically advanced nation?”

“Yeah,” Sam continued. “The whole thing with the ambassador was because I arrived before the prince. So…you don’t need us.”

“We’re idiots.”

“Total dumbasses.”

“We’ve got nothing on you or your people!”

“You’re all incredibly awesome!”

“It’s why white Americans hate you!”

“Pay up,” Clint said to Natasha. “Told you they’d freak out.”

She grumbled some curses in Russian but nonetheless gave him some money.

Everyone else, including T’Chaka seemed amused by the two, but the man said nothing about it and continued to speak, “I’m pleased to hear your compliments, and yes my people would’ve been the first to handle this, but I wouldn’t have contacted you all if it wasn’t of the…of the utmost importance.”

Bucky and Sam lost their enthusiasm when they saw the pained look on the man. King T’Chaka was old but the expression on his face made his age stand out more than ever.

The other’s lost their amusement and Rhodey stepped forward, “Your highness.” He offered a hand on the man’s shoulder, “It’ll be alright.”

The man didn’t seem to be listening to him; he was busy trying not to break down in front of them all. Right now he didn’t look like the regal king everyone was used to seeing, but a damaged and broken man.

Steve was the one who stepped forward, catching Bucky and Sam’s attention, “Prince T’Challa is missing.”

The two friends stared at him in shock, turning to each other and then back.

“No way,” Bucky muttered.

There was no way Prince T’Challa, one of Wakanda’s strongest warriors, would go missing, especially not when he constantly had the Dora Milaje as his guards.

“I’m afraid so,” Steve continued. 

“We believe he’s being held against his will,” Tony spoke as he went through his phone; he no longer sounded like the rich white boys they usually avoided.

“You’re saying someone got past the _Dora Milaje_ and kidnapped him?” Sam asked.

“Like hell they got past them,” Natasha said. “They all saw their prince get mixed in the crowd at a club and then disappeared. He called them later to tell them he was alright, that he wouldn’t be giving them their location, and had no intention of returning.”

“My son would never do this,” T’Chaka spoke again, finally feeling strong enough to talk. “He has abandoned his duties as prince; he has abandoned his family…That’s not something my son would do of his free will.”

“He’s actually been giving us updates,” Rhodey continued. “So technically he’s not missing, but we don’t know his location and so we can’t be sure that he’s safe.”

“So why us? Why not your bodyguards?” Sam asked.

“Because of this,” Tony said taking his phone and projecting the hologram for them to see. There were several texts, more like threats.

“As you can see,” Natasha said. “He’s made several threats against his father: if the Dora Milaje get involved he will publicly announce that he has renounced his duties as Prince of Wakanda, as well as give information to other parties if we don’t leave him be.” 

“And Wakanda has many enemies,” Clint continued. “Including the US, because who hasn’t made the US their enemy? It’s why we cooked up a story that T’Challa is at home tending to some matters there. These people might take advantage of the situation in any way they can.”

“That’s why you need me,” Sam whispered and began to explain to Bucky. “The tech the prince gave me has my biometric input. And because it was an experimental tech, it malfunctioned and no one else was able to gain access to it.”

“And because it malfunctioned, it was also not registered as one of our technological assets,” T’Chaka said. “That means it can help track T’Challa without a problem.”

Of course. Wakandan tech was usually registered with a traceable alloy once finished, so it would be easier to track one if it ever got exported or sold illegally. And because they were all registered, T’Challa could easily create a software that could detect if it he was being tracked by Wakandan tech, never mind external tech. No wonder Sam promised to never use it again.

“So basically that tech could get access to a lot of personal things belonging to T’Challa, like emails, accounts, anything?” Bucky asked.

“And that’s where you come in,” Steve said. “Because he would’ve taken extra precautions to ensure no one tracked him down, you’re perfect for doing the job.”

“Normally these types of missions are for me and Barton,” Natasha spoke. “But T’Challa has also threatened us if we get involved, he and King T’Chaka have supported the Avengers and so he knows more than we care to allow him to reveal.”

“I came to you because Captain Rogers and I were referred to you by someone at SHIELD,” T’Chaka said. “He told us you were as good as Romanoff and Barton, that you handle discretion well, and that you’re a good man.”

Bucky couldn’t deny any of that, except maybe for that last part, but at the same time he did not like the feel of this. If both the Avengers _and_ the Dora Milaje weren’t involved because it was too dangerous then what guarantee did he have for his safety or Sam’s? 

“Your son is dangerous if he wants to be,” Bucky said, his voice quiet. “What guarantee do we have that we’re not going to get caught up in more than we can handle?” 

Sam wanted to scold Bucky for saying that but he couldn’t, he was right. There was no sure way of knowing if this was going to affect them, he didn’t blame Bucky for being scared.

“You don’t,” T’Chaka sighed in resignation. 

Bucky sighed, running a hand through his hair in doubt. This was probably not something he should be getting involved with.

“Please Mr. Barnes,” T’Chaka spoke, his voice hoarse and tears prickled at his eyes making Bucky’s gut clench and his insides twist with sympathy. “I’m not asking you as a king,” the man continued, a tear falling from his eyes. “I’m asking you as a _father_.”

Bucky narrowed his eyes at the king when he heard that, an amused smile finding its way to his lips.

“Are you trying to guilt-trip me?” he asked, earning a smack on his arm from Sam.

The king only chuckled, enjoying the momentary distraction from his pain, “That depends, is it working?”

Bucky chuckled in amusement; well he couldn’t say ‘no’ now, “I charge by the hour, plus other expenses.”

He was not expecting them to cheer in joy, but he figured he didn’t get to complain.

T’Chaka took his hand in gratitude, “Thank you,” then he took Sam’s. “Both of you.”

“Ok, let’s get to work,” Bucky said, turning to the rest. “I need every detail you’ve been able to gather."

~~~~~

King T’Chaka left after discussing everything he could with Bucky; the best thing for him to do was take care of his business as usual so as not to arouse suspicion. In the meantime Bucky and Sam got comfortable as they waited for Sam’s old tech to show up.

“Ok here it is,” Rhodey called, walking over to them with a box. “It’s the stuff T’Challa lent you Wilson.”

Sam looked like a kid receiving present on Christmas, which just made Bucky curious.

“Alright what’s this thing?” Bucky asked.

“This is my baby,” Sam giggled as he unwrapped the box.

Everyone else stood by waiting to see what it was; they were surprised, and frankly disappointed, when he took out a little red device that looked like a toy airplane.

“That’s it?” Bucky asked.

“Yep,” Sam said with a large grin. “Redwing, activate.”

They could hear a few gears and wires shifting from the device until it came alive, it literally came alive.

The thing opened its camera like it was an eye and when it saw Sam it started chirping loudly and hovering in the air.

“Aww I missed you too buddy!” Sam cooed. “How’ve you been?”

“Wait,” Bucky shook his head in disbelief. “This is Redwing? This is the Redwing you and Riley cried about having to leave behind as if he were a child that grew up and you had to let go of?”

Sam turned to glare at him, holding Redwing close to him, “Don’t speak lightly of my baby.”

Bucky only stared with disbelief but shook his head and said nothing.

“Alright let’s go,” he said to Sam who got up to follow him, still smiling and cooing at Redwing.

“Wait you guys are leaving?” Clint asked.

“Yeah, I can’t waste time and I got all my stuff at my apartment,” Bucky said. “I’ll call you guys if I find anything.”

Before they could say anything else he and Sam were gone.

“Do you guys think we can trust them?” Rhodey asked.

“I talked to Fury,” Natasha answered. “He says he trusts Barnes.”

“Meaning, that’s a fifty-fifty chance that he’s actually trustworthy,” Clint continued.

“Either way we have no choice,” Steve offered. “We can’t risk investigating T’Challa ourselves; he might know we’re onto him.”

“Man I hate not doing anything,” Rhodey groaned.

They didn’t have to confirm how much they hated it too, their friend was out there and they couldn’t do much to help him. 

After a few moments, they each went to see if they could find or do anything. Steve, not knowing what else to do, went to his room. There he pulled up a holographic screen of the files belonging to Bucky. He was a licensed PI, had a social security number, birth date and school records. The guy had every single paper in order, and yet he couldn’t find anything on him until a few years ago. It was like this new person just popped into the planet.

“Can’t find anything on him?” Natasha asked, surprising Steve.

“It’s like he didn’t exist before Fury found him,” Steve replied.

“You’re telling me, I only found some old records of him working in Russia under a James Buchanan Barnes. Which would explain why he’s good but it doesn’t explain why nobody knows about him.”

Steve sighed heavily, this guy was a huge mystery, one that he would figure out; if only to see if this wouldn’t bite any of them in the ass.

With that in mind he stood up and grabbed his jacket.

“I’m going out,” he explained quickly before exiting and leaving Natasha smiling after him, she knew where he was going. She turned back to the screen of the man in a picture and wondered where he had come from.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> remember to check me out: [tumblr](http://crimson-waterlily.tumblr.com/)


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve gets to see Bucky at work, it makes him want to know more about the private investigator. Meanwhile Bucky gets closer to finding T'Challa.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Steve used to be an idiot, so did Sam, Bucky might still be. I would definitely do what Bucky does with his metal arm here. 
> 
> Warning: offscreen harrassment and violence, non-consensual touching and implied sexual abuse.

Chapter 3

Bucky currently sat at home working on his computer, Sam left Redwing with him to go work at the bar. While he was making a little progress, it was annoying having the stupid thing looking at him with that cutesy droid eye.

“Stop looking,” he snapped, making the thing beep in fear and turn its eye.

Bucky smiled at it while rolling his eyes; fine, he thought the droid was cute, kind of like R2 and BB-8. It was also useful; with it he was able to get access to everything useful he would need. The only reason he was taking so long was because the information was still hidden behind several data bases and code encryptions, an extra security measure but not one that would get him detected, only delayed momentarily. He was sure he’d be able to find T’Challa by tomorrow and all thanks to this little red droid. He got his metal hand near the guy who beeped in joy when the vibranium had a reaction to his metal arm. He smiled at the little guy and went back to work.

As he was going through the codes he heard a knock on the door.

“If you haven’t figured it out, it’s open!” he called.

After a few moments Steve stepped into the room, “It’s still polite to knock.”

“Well I’m surprised anyone’s still polite anymore, I was so sure politeness died with manspreading.”

Steve nodded in agreement at that, watching him work, “How’s it coming?”

“Shouldn’t take more than two days,” Bucky said.

“Really?!” Steve exclaimed, completely relieved to hear that. 

“I have access to all his personal information, including emails, bank statements, even download and purchase history. The information is still encrypted though, so I have to keep digging for anything worthwhile. It shouldn’t take too long to go through all of it. Hey, did you know he likes Avril Lavigne?”

Steve chuckled, “Oh yeah, he told me he went to see a concert when he turned eighteen. His dad wanted to give him his first jet but no, he wanted to see her perform.”

“Wow, never thought I’d get to see this side of the Prince of Wakanda.”

“Yeah, he’s a great guy, I’ll introduce you when you find him.”

The way he said _when_ made Bucky look at him in sympathy. That alone made him want to finish this faster. Losing someone is awful, but it’s even more awful when someone still hopes when there isn’t hope. He had to find the prince before any of them, especially the king and his family, reached that point.

“Anyways why are you here?” Bucky asked derailing from the subject. “Not that I want to kick you out.”

“I just wanted to see how you were doing and to maybe offer assistance.”

“Sorry Captain, but I fly solo. I’m not like your little group, not even Sam helps out.”

“I get that, but when you asked about T’Challa it got me thinking, this could be dangerous, I don’t want you having to do this alone.”

Bucky scrutinized from top to bottom, trying to figure him out, finally he said, “You don’t trust me do you?”

Steve chuckled nervously for a while before he eventually said, “Yeah pretty much.”

Bucky gave him a smug grin before he shrugged, “There’s food and drinks in the fridge, I just went shopping, help yourself.”

Steve was surprised at that but he smiled in gratitude and went to the kitchen, he did feel like making himself a sandwich. He came back with another one for Bucky who looked at it for a while before going back to typing. He didn’t say thank you but that was okay with Steve, he only smiled in satisfaction when Bucky picked it up a few moments later.

“So what got you into doing all this?”

Bucky gave him a pointed glare making Steve raise his hands in surrender.

“Overstepping my boundaries,” Steve admitted.

“Very much so,” Bucky said.

“Sorry, I’m just not sure what to talk to you about.”

“Well you don’t have to.”

“Doesn’t it feel uncomfortable without me talking?”

“Not really, I’m used to spending my nights alone.”

Steve felt surprised by that, he figured the guy would spend at least some time with Sam. He didn't say anything though, it wasn't his business and Bucky made it clear that he wasn't allowed to overstep boundaries, even _if_ he was technically here to spy on him. Damn, Natasha would laugh at his inability to be a proper spy.

Not knowing what else to do Steve went to pick out the first book he spotted, Pride and Prejudice. He smiled at the worn out cover, it reminded him so much of the first time he’d read it. The cover wasn’t so worn out then, but now it must be if it wasn’t destroyed. His hands softly opened the book, going through the first pages.

“Hey careful with that one,” Bucky called. “It’s an antique.”

“Figured, you like Jane Austen?”

“Hell yeah, she’s awesome. Sure my testosterone sometimes craves action but if I ever want to sit down and read something it’s her.”

“I hear you,” Steve laughed, going through the book. He flipped through the pages almost expertly until he found the passage and read it out loud, “From the very beginning,” Bucky looked up briefly at Steve when he started, “— from the first moment, I may almost say— of my acquaintance with you.” Bucky had an amused smile and soon he was joining Steve in the quote, “Your manners, impressing me with the fullest belief of your arrogance, your conceit, and your selfish disdain of the feelings of others, were such as to form the groundwork of disapprobation on which succeeding events have built so immovable a dislike; and I had not known you a month before I felt that you were the last man in the world whom I could ever be prevailed on to marry.”

They burst out laughing at that last part.

“The hottest burn!” Bucky exclaimed.

“Holy crap, this line is still awesome!” Steve yelled as he unconsciously went to sit next to Bucky, who still continued to work through his laughs. “You know I never actually considered reading this book if it weren’t for my ex-wife.”

Bucky was surprised to hear that, “You’re wife?”

Steve got a faraway look as he looked at the book, “She was great.”

Bucky continued to type but he slightly angled his head to let Steve know he was listening.

“At that time I didn’t know why it was so important to her for me to like this book.”

“At that time being in the 40s?” Bucky asked.

Steve chuckled lightly; Tony often liked to call him old for that. Everyone knew of his story, of how he fought against the Nazi division known as Hydra and had ended up frozen in the ice. 

“Her name was Peggy right?” Bucky asked.

“Yeah, when she gave me the book she said I just had to read it and to let her know what I thought. I have to admit at first I was a jerk.”

“Really, Captain America was a jerk?”

Steve chuckled, burying his face in his hand, “I actually complained about how there were too many women and the men hardly got any time in there.”

“Yikes, how’d that go for you?”

“…I’d rather not say.”

Bucky ended up laughing, not realizing it was the first time he’d been so relaxed around someone who wasn’t Sam. Once he noticed his lips stretched wide he shook his head and continued typing, choosing to focus on the case. He shouldn’t allow himself this moment of joy, and he was disgusting for doing so.

Steve noticed Bucky’s action, but he didn’t bother asking. Perhaps Bucky had felt the need to shake off the feeling of joy because of the case, in which case Steve didn’t blame him for he shouldn’t have distracted him. With that in mind he proceeded to read the book, but before that he wanted to say something on his mind.

“Hey look,” Steve spoke. “I just want you to know that I may not trust you completely, but that’s just because I can barely find anything on you. Not because I think you’re a bad person, I just want to make sure this won’t bite me or my friends in the ass…Plus I can’t exactly distrust you now that I know you’ve memorized the hottest burn ever.”

Bucky bit his lip and went silent after hearing that. Steve was so wrong to think he wasn’t a bad person; he was the shittiest person ever, but he couldn’t say that. Eventually he gave a long sigh, “Look I just want you to know that…I’m an asshole, but I’ll get your friend back, so don’t worry.”

Steve smiled awkwardly, not sure why Bucky referred to himself as an asshole but assured that he would get him his friend back.

Steve spent the next two hours reading in silence as Bucky worked. It was getting dark but Steve didn’t mind, he wanted to be there in case it was needed, besides he was almost done reading.

“Hey,” finally Bucky said. “Does T’Challa have a habit for wiring money through several accounts?”

Steve frowned, looking up from the book, “Not at all.”

“Okay well this is weird, there are several money checks that have been wired through several accounts until they reached Richard Voorhees.”

“Am I supposed to know who that is?” Steve asked.

“Some drug dealer,” Bucky answered.

“So you know him?” Steve asked. 

“I know everybody. So, ready for a field trip?”

Steve looked surprised but he just nodded with a shrug and set the book aside, some other time Jane Austen.

“Let’s go then, Redwing make sure no gets their hands on the data.”

The droid beeped excitedly so Bucky took that as a yes and pulled Steve along.

“I’ll drive,” Steve said as they headed out.

“Why?” Bucky asked, but his question was answered when he saw the amazing bike in front of him. Steve climbed without another word, just a confident smirk on his face, and threw a helmet at Bucky.

Bucky shook his head in amusement and disbelief before he climbed behind the guy. He then decided to mess with him so he wrapped his hands around the other’s torso and leaned in to whisper, “Nice wheels.”

He smiled in triumph when he felt Steve tense and clear his throat before choking, “Which way.”

Bucky happily told him, enjoying himself the rest of the way. It felt relaxing, being like this with someone else besides Sam, in such close proximity that he could feel their heartbeat. Unknowingly he rested his head against Steve’s shoulder who smiled at the gesture but said nothing.

~~~~~

“Ok, this is where the guy lives,” Bucky explained as he and Steve got off the bike.

“Nice place,” Steve muttered sarcastically as he looked at the nearly run down building.

“Draws less attention to himself that way,” Bucky shrugged as he walked in, followed by Steve.

They headed up a few flights of stairs until they reached the desired floor then the door to the guy’s apartment. 

“No key around,” Steve observed, running his hands around the top frame. 

Bucky ignored him and used his metal hand to twist the nob until it broke. “Found one,” he said, smiling in amusement when he saw Steve’s scolding glare.

He opened the door and saw no one in the living room so he went further inside and to one of the rooms without a door and only a man lying in it, snoring loudly with a few bottles of alcohol next to him.

“Hey asshole!” he called startling the man awake.

“What the!” the man yelled.

“Hi there,” Bucky said, an all too pleasant smile on his face. “I need to ask you some questions about some money you’ve been cashing recently.”

The man stared dumbfounded for a while. Steve raised his eyebrows at him in wait, thinking the man was still too drunk to grasp anything. Bucky, however, knew better than to buy that.

The man stayed like that for a while before he darted his hand under a pillow, producing a gun and aiming it at Bucky. Bucky took a few steps to reach him, and when the guy shot he blocked it with his metal hand, he reached for the gun then crushed it in his palm.

The guy backed away in fear as Bucky threw the shattered remains aside, “Oh fuck! Oh shit! You’re one of them!”

“Damn that was my favorite glove asshole,” Bucky muttered looking at the gun hole in his glove. 

“Hey do you need any help?” Steve asked Bucky, catching his attention as they both ignored the man’s cries of fear.

“Nah, I’m good, just go stand guard,” Bucky answered.

When Steve left Bucky turned back to the man, “Now where was I? Oh right, about the money you’ve been getting.”

“I-I-I don’t have to tell you!” the man exclaimed, trying to sound brave.

“Seriously, you’re gonna be so much better off if you don’t make this difficult. You’ll go to prison for a while once I call the authorities and tell them where you are, and you’ll be able to conserve your testicles.”

“You won’t be able to hide if you hurt me, I’ll tell the world about you and what you are! There’ll be no place to hide!” 

Bucky smirked, “Do I look like I’ve got nowhere to hide? No, you know why? Cause’ people don’t want to hear about super humans unless they’re part of the Avengers. They’d rather label you as a crazy drug dealer than admit I can stop your bullets with my arm, or that I can melt your insides with my laser eyes, which wouldn’t leave a trace...Speak, now.”

The man still doubted but eventually he bit his lip and said, “Ok look, I’m just the middle guy, the money is for me to transfer to a local account.”

“Which account, do you have the number?”

“Yeah it’s right here, bank too,” the man said taking out his wallet and throwing it to Bucky.

Bucky looked through it, searching for a number and he finally found it. 

“Do you by any chance know who this guy is?” he asked, pocketing the information.

“No, never spoke to him in person. He just said he wouldn’t go to the police with some evidence he has of me dealing to a few minors.”

“You dealt to minors?” Bucky asked while glaring at the man.

“Hey just one time and I didn’t know they were minors, I don’t deal to kids!”

Bucky glared at him, it was true, Voorhees often didn’t deal to minors; he may be a criminal but he still has his code.

“Alright, when’s the next drop off?” he asked instead.

“I made it just yesterday; next one’s supposed to be in two days.”

“Plenty of time,” Bucky muttered. “Alright, thanks for that. By the way you need to fix your door...Laser eyes, moron.”

He exited the place and met with Steve outside, clicking his teeth in annoyance as he saw his glove. First Ward and now this guy, he really had to start taking his gloves off when he met with these guys.

“I can’t say I approve of the way you handle things,” Steve commented.

“Which is why I fly solo,” Bucky said. “You should be happy, I’m one step closer.”

“I am, but is it wise to let the guy keep selling drugs?”

“He doesn’t force people to do anything with them, he just gives them what they want, the most dangerous substance he deals is coke which he only gives in small amounts, and he doesn’t deal to minors. Don’t see why I should get involved. Besides I might need him later.”

Steve sighed as they continued walking.

“So now we go back to your apartment?”

“Now back to my apartment,” Bucky replied and began to walk out but stopped when he received a text, “On second thought we’re going to need to take a detour.”

Steve frowned in confusion but decided not to ask when he saw Bucky’s jaw tense and his metal arm clench. It sure looked important.

~~~~~

Steve could feel Bucky’s muscles tense against his as the man tried his best to keep from squeezing while they rode toward the place Bucky told him to. It was a bar close to Bucky’s apartment and there he saw a woman cradling her cheek and being held by a guy as a few other men stood in between her and a man who looked angry. 

“Come on, that bitch wanted to come with me!” the man yelled.

Bucky quickly got off the bike and Steve hurried up to catch him.

“Carl, what the fuck happened?” Bucky called.

The man holding the woman turned to him, from this close Steve could see she was not only injured but also either high or drunk, she also looked very young.

“I was keeping an eye on her but I went to the bathroom when I got out I saw the dude dragging her out. When she struggled he hit her. So I got the boys to help,” Carl explained as he held the girl.

Bucky turned to glare at the man who kept arguing with the other guys and was trying to get past them to the girl. Steve felt a cold chill when he heard Bucky hiss, “Is he drunk?”

“No, don’t worry we saved him for you,” Carl answered with a large grin.

“Good, I want him to feel this.”

When Steve heard those words he felt his skin crawl, he knew what the man was capable but he felt no desire to stop him. 

Bucky’s face was blank save for his eyes, which showed how he craved blood at the moment, and stomped toward the guy who kept yelling insults about the girl, and when he saw Bucky he scoffed, “What you the bitch’s boyfriend?”

Bucky didn’t bother to answer he just punched the guy in the gut, making him double over. Afterwards he took the man by the arm, with his metal hand, and twisted until they all heard a pop in the arm followed by the man’s scream.

Steve couldn’t help but wince when the guy's bone started pushing against the skin as he screamed in pain but Bucky didn’t let go.

“You feel how much that hurts?” Bucky hissed venomously. “I want you to remember this pain the next time you even _think_ of touching a woman without her consent!” Bucky hissed, to which the man nodded desperately and when Bucky released him he ran off limping with his arm.

The rest of the guys cheered as the man ran off and clapped Bucky’s shoulder before going back into the bar. Bucky ignored them and went toward Carl and the girl.

“Free drinks next time Barnes,” Carl chuckled.

“Are you kidding? Sam would kill me, besides you know some of your customers hate me.” Bucky scoffed with a smile on his face as if he hadn’t just broken a man’s arm.

“I know, I was joking,” Carl laughed as he let go of the girl for Bucky to carry and then went back inside.

“Hey kiddo…Wanda?” he called to her when he realized she had dozed off

“Hm,” the girl mumbled as Bucky lifted.

“Let’s get you home,” he said to her as she buried her face in his chest.

With that said Bucky started walking toward his apartment. Steve, not knowing what else to do, followed. He saw Bucky cradling the girl and he also saw how she started shivering while Bucky did his best to rub her sleeveless arms to keep her warm. He decided to take his jacket off and place it over her, smiling awkwardly when Bucky looked at him.

“Sorry,” Bucky muttered. “I forgot you were there.”

“Don’t worry, I didn’t miss the fun.”

And Steve couldn’t deny that it was fun indeed.

~~~~~

After they took Wanda to her place they returned to Bucky’s apartment, Steve sat quietly as Bucky typed away in the computer. Every now and then Steve would look at Bucky with a fond smile as Bucky worked, one which Bucky noticed and was immediately annoyed by.

“What?” he snapped.

“…You’re great! Seriously you’re so amazing!” Steve exclaimed, not able to help himself. Gosh, if Peggy were alive she would be so proud of Bucky.

Bucky wasn’t thinking the same thing as Steve, he stopped typing and stood up abruptly to go get a drink; he came back with a bottle of vodka and started drinking from it. He didn’t want to hear it; he didn’t want this man to think something so completely wrong, something he shouldn’t be thinking.

Steve smiled sadly and looked away, deciding to go back to reading Pride and Prejudice but even that book could barely keep him occupied. He honestly didn’t understand why the guy became distant at times. It was odd but he wouldn’t ask him anything, he would just have to get to know him and hope he could get Bucky to let him know what he was doing wrong.

After a few hours Steve sat back on the couch after finishing the book, waiting for Bucky to finish. Only then did he notice that Bucky had fallen asleep on the couch. Steve smiled and went to take the laptop and Redwing from him, ordering Redwing to power down and hide everything from prying eyes.

He then gently pulled Bucky’s legs up on the couch, and laid his head down on the cushions before covering him with a blanket, once he was done he was pleased when Bucky snuggled deeper into the couch. Despite how much Steve wanted to keep looking for T’Challa, Bucky was probably too exhausted, he wouldn’t help anyone like that. He allowed Bucky his due rest, since they were closer to finding T’Challa.

Not knowing what else to do he exited the apartment and went to Sam’s bar, he felt like maybe talking to someone and getting a drink. The bar was pretty nice, it was small but it was lit just right, the tables weren’t much but the bar looked like it was made of fine mahogany. 

“Hello there,” Sam called when he saw Steve enter. “Fancy a drink?”

“Hell yeah,” Steve sighed, walking over to him, waving at some of the other clients who recognized him but were too drunk to say anything. 

“So how has working with Bucky been?” Sam asked as he poured something for Steve, he didn’t think drinks were supposed to be blue but oh well.

“To some point,” Steve said, looking at the drink curiously. “Traumatizing.”

Sam chuckled.

“Yeah he can be a handful, but I imagine you’ve made progress.”

“Hell yeah, the guy’s good,” Steve admitted. “Right now he’s sleeping, I think he’s exhausted, but I’m sure he’ll have something by tomorrow morning.”

“That’s Barnes for you; he works cases through and through.”

Steve nodded in affirmation and was silent for a moment, or rather he was debating how to phrase his words and not have them sound pathetic.

“Something on your mind?” Sam asked.

Steve gulped for a bit before he cleared his throat and spoke, “Do you two-um? Are you guys-?”

“Oh no man, we’re just _really_ good friends,” Sam explained. “Why, you thinking about asking him out?”

Steve gaped at that, “I-.”

“Cause’ he’s not gonna stop having sex with me if that’s what you think.”

“No, I honestly don’t mind that,” Steve quickly said. “I just, I want to get to know him more…He seems to hate it when I say something nice about him, he’s also very aggressive and frankly impulsive, but I just want to see if I can get to know him better and maybe see where that goes.”

Sam gave a long sigh, “Well you gotta understand, you’re sighing up for a train wreck.”

Steve nodded; he figured out that much out. 

“So if he’s such a train wreck, why are you his friend?” Steve asked, hoping he wasn’t overstepping his boundaries.

Sam shrugged, “I wasn’t a walk in the park either, hell maybe I’m still not, I mean I have to manipulate the guy with my ass to get him to talk to me. It’s just that…”

Steve saw the sad smile and waited, the man was hurting and he shouldn’t have asked anything but he would listen if he was ready. 

“My boyfriend…he died a while back,” Sam explained. “And all I did after that was drink my ass off until I collapsed. I didn’t even like alcohol, ironic for a bar owner…but it made me feel numb, so I drank. Bucky would sometimes pry the bottles from my hands, he'd drink it himself but eh. He’d be the one to drag my ass to therapy and shit, after a while I started getting better and stuff. I opened up the bar and moved on…He hasn’t told me about his issues but he’s a good man, he needs what I needed: time and patience.” 

Steve nodded in understanding and raised his glass to Sam, both in gratitude and assurance that he wouldn’t lose patience with Bucky when, and if, he decided to ask him out. 

He really wanted to get to know Bucky, to spend more time talking to him about Jane Austen, or other great authors. Maybe he could learn a few things about why Bucky liked all the books he had, why they were so old, anything really. He wanted to get to know the guy who broke a man’s arm for touching a helpless woman, he wanted to see the Bucky who had fallen asleep on the couch after a long day of hard work.

If that was the Bucky underneath the drinks at noon, then perhaps getting burned wouldn’t be so bad if he could play with the fire.

~~~~~

Meanwhile Bucky dreamt, but like always they weren’t good dreams.

_He woke him up with a kiss, ignoring Bucky’s soft sob through it, and ran his hands down his back and to his thighs. All the while Bucky’s mind screamed for mercy._

Bucky bolted in the couch, throwing his arms around and gasping in shock. He took long deep breaths until he finally took in his surroundings. 

He was okay, he was alright. 

_Shlof shoyn mayn tayer faygele_  
_Makh shoyn tsu dayn kosher aygelekh_  
_Shlof shoyn shlof_  
_In ziser ruh_  
_Aaaaai lu lu lu lu lu lu_

He sang, feeling his breathing calm down with every melodious word. He was finally able to release some tension in his body. 

He tried to distract himself with anything else when the panic attack passed; luckily he had a warm blanket to serve that purpose. He eyed it in curiosity, wondering how it got there, until he turned and noticed that Steve was gone. The man had laid a blanket over him while he was sleeping, that brought a small pleasant smile to Bucky. 

He ran his fingers through the blanket and bit his lip, remembering Steve and his warm smile, how the man told him a fun anecdote of how he once sounded like a sexist asshole, or how he felt so comfortable being so close to the guy during the motorcycle ride. He smiled at all those thoughts but then he remembered that he shouldn’t even care about that, a piece of shit like him shouldn’t be celebrating that someone was kind to him. He threw the blanket aside, grabbed a bottle and started drinking. Steve may not know he was shit but he did, and shit like him didn’t get a guy like Steve, because if Steve ever found out about him he would hate him, just like Sam would, just like others would, just like he did.

He should probably get back to working the case so he turned both his laptop and Redwing on; there he saw that most of the codes he was running had found what he was looking for. Now he had the account’s statement along with all the things that were purchased with it. 

He smirked at the list but since he was tired he would check out the places first thing in the morning, or in a few hours since it was already 4 am. He tried going back to sleep but he just couldn’t stop thinking about Steve, his smile, his laugh, his kind words. Who cared anyways? Nothing was ever going to happen there.

Finally getting frustrated with his thoughts he decided to leave already and check the places out, he would have to wait until they opened but it was better to go there instead of dwelling on some stupid beefy blond specimen.

First the Prince of Wakanda.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel like these chapters have been slow but don't worry we'll get to the plot, also I just realized I'm going to have fun with Sam's backstory.
> 
> Feel free to scream at me on [tumblr](http://crimson-waterlily.tumblr.com/)


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ....I'm sorry (probably not, no I am because I'm horrible and yes this is the summary for this chapter).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: implied sexual abuse and death, as well as blood.

Bucky is, in all respects, positive that there was a guy involved in all of this, “this” being T’Challa’s disappearance. 

He had stopped by a lingerie store, a watch store, and a suit store. He highly doubted T’Challa needed lingerie, a Rolex and a suit, considering he came from Wakanda he had all those things but in better quality. Now it no longer seemed like the guy was actually missing anymore, just eloping; but he wasn’t going to go ahead and tell the King of Wakanda that. Besides, it still seemed off; T’Challa didn’t seem to be the type to be an idiot in love or someone who can be easily conned. Plus, whoever had Prince T’Challa at their disposal was certainly wasting their time buying useless things. 

In every place it was the same, none of the people seemed to be willing to admit that the Prince of Wakanda had been at their store. Bucky had to use his fake SHIELD ID to get them to talk with a promise that this wouldn’t affect them in the slightest. Unfortunately none of them could give him much so he ended up having to go to another address listed on the bill statement. 

Just as he was walking he got a call and saw that it was Sam. He groaned and rolled his eyes, the guy probably knew about him and Steve spending time together. The majority of the time Sam would just text him, unless it had to do with a potential boo.

He reluctantly answered it, muttering a blunt, “Nothing happened.”

“Oh but he likes you!” Sam answered excitedly. “He came down to the bar yesterday and talked about you, he’s thinking about asking you out.”

“I don’t give a crap, nothing’s happening there.”

“Ten bucks says you end up banging him by the end of the month, at most.”

“Not happening.”

“Come on, do it for me…I’ll be the dom!”

“You hate being the dom, you think it’s too much work.”

He heard Sam chuckle before he fell silent, “Man, Riley would’ve wanted to bet on this.”

Bucky remained silent and only smiled in encouragement, even if Sam couldn’t see it.

“You know he was first on the list of guys he’d sleep with,” Sam continued.

“Oh so he was above me?” Bucky complained earning a chuckle.

“Hell yeah, he’s Captain America.”

“I hate you.”

“Anyways, what’re you doing right now, are you with him?”

“No, I didn’t want to call him. Now shut up, I’m going to a lead in a really nice part of New York. Seriously only the super-rich would come here. Everyone’s looking at me, I totally stand out.”

“You do kinda dress like a hobo.”

“Fuck you!”

Sam chuckled, “Well let me know if there’s anything I can do, I don’t feel like I actually did much…I guess I should be used to that.”

Bucky sighed softly, making sure Sam didn’t hear it. He wasn’t sure what brought on this shit but Sam rarely talked about Riley, or how useless he sometimes felt. And hell if Bucky was going to let the guy feel bad about himself, “Hey, I couldn’t have done it without you.”

“All I did was turn a little robot on,” Sam muttered.

“And you gave him instructions to let me and anyone else in the Avengers use him, which allowed me to get the info I needed.”

Bucky bit his lip, not liking the silence that followed.

“Hey Sam,” he asked in a taut voice. “Are you feeling okay?”

He heard Sam sigh on the other end, “Eh, you get it, I have my moments.”

Bucky absolutely got that, sometimes those shitty moments came out of the blue for no reason, PTSD sucked that way.

“Are you gonna be okay?” Bucky asked.

“Yeah, just let me know if you need anything.”

Bucky smiled, “Well I think I’m out of groceries again, mind going shopping for me.” 

“Alright, I’m gonna start charging you for that.” 

“Catch ya later!” Bucky chuckled.

“Sleep with Rogers!” 

That was the last thing Sam said before he hung up, it made Bucky roll his eyes and smile in amusement before his face turned into a frown. He shouldn’t be the one comforting Sam, he should just stop answering the calls altogether but as always he couldn’t. He had this huge need to help Sam whenever he could, even if it was giving him something to occupy himself such as grocery shopping. Ironic how he wouldn’t blink an eye if he was feeling like shit but the instant Sam did, he sprang into action, and for that he couldn’t distance himself from the asshole completely. 

He sighed heavily, thankful for the next call to distract him; however it just annoyed him when this time it was Steve.

“Sup,” he grunted, rubbing his eyes.

“I just wanted to know how it was going, I stopped by your place and you weren’t there.”

“I woke up early, decided to go check some shit out,” Bucky replied, voice tight.

“Do you need any help?”

“Nah, just tell King T’Chaka that I might be getting close.”

“Oh that’s good, I’ll uh…I’ll tell him.”

“Thanks.”

Damn it he just wanted the conversation to end!

“Anyways, I was thinking-.”

“Oh what’s that?!” Bucky called into the phone before he started making static noises. “Sorry, can’t hear you!” He made more static noises. “Going through a tunnel, call you back!”

He hastily hung up, sighing in relief. He was pretty sure Steve didn’t buy it but he didn’t want to deal with him at the moment. It was going to be fine, he would find Prince T’Challa and be done with this case and he would never have to see Steve ever again. He just had to hold out and divert Steve from asking him out, afterwards he could just go on with his shitty life without a problem.

As usual Bucky never got that lucky, his luck was always shit.

He realized this as he continued to walk toward the address and realized that the buildings and shops looked familiar. He passed a shop that sold bouquets; that was undeniably something he remembered, as well as the salon, and the house on the corner was a different color but still the same one. 

That was when panic began to hit him; he had been through this street before.

The place he was going to was close, and he had been there.

His suspicions were confirmed, it was different, it had a different name and design but it was the same place.

“No, no, no, no!” he groaned as he neared the place, his heart thumping fast in panic.

He burst through the doors and into the Asian fusion restaurant. It was the same, just with different decorations, the dance floor was still in the middle and there were several plants which had replaced other decorations, he doubted the music they played was the same either, but it was still the same place that monster brought him to.

“Excuse me sir,” a man said to him as he eyed the place but he barely paid attention. “We’re not open yet.”

“Didn’t this place use to be different?” Bucky asked, ignoring the man’s words. 

The man was taken aback by the blunt question but answered, “Yes, Niku bought the place and opened eight months ago. May I make a reservation for you?”

“I’m an investigator,” Bucky quickly said, gulping down his breath. “I’m looking for someone of high profile.”

“Well there are several high profile people who come here-.”

“He’s from Wakanda,” Bucky interrupted, watching he man’s eyes widen. “You know who I’m talking about.”

“I’m sorry sir but we were told to not say a word.”

“Just tell me what he was doing?” Bucky snapped, taking out the SHIELD ID. “If you don’t answer me I will have SHIELD search the premises, if you don’t want that then tell me what happened!”

The man seemed to struggle, he clearly didn’t want any trouble, finally after a moment he answered, “He came here recently, I believe the day before yesterday.” 

Bucky gulped, brief images flashing in his head. “Was he with someone?” he asked, fearing the answer.

The man bit his lip but answered, “Yes, his companion wanted a particular table in the back. There was a couple already seated there, but I must’ve lost my mind or something. I told them to leave.” 

He could no longer breathe; he remembered it, the horrible voice that still haunted his nightmares.

Bucky shook his head, it couldn’t be, it just couldn’t, “No it’s not possible.”

“What’s not possible is our sommelier comping him a $500 bottle, when he ordered his favorite dish, an Italian dish, our chef actually hunted the recipe down, and when they went to the dance floor he actually got the band to play some swing music instead of the usual waltz.”

At this point Bucky no longer heard him, his feet moved on their own toward the table at the back. 

He remembered how the place looked with people and the old decorations; he remembered being led to the back from where they could see the dance floor. 

He remembered the toasting.

_“To our anniversary,” the man chimed in his Russian accent. Bucky drank, then proceeded to eat the dish brought in. “You’ll love it.”_

_“I’ll love it,” he had replied._

_“Then smile.”_

_He smiled._

_After dinner he said, “Now go dance for me.”_

_He went to dance with anyone who asked him to, he always loved watching him move to the swing music with someone else before taking his turn._

_“I’m tired,” he whispered pleadingly._

_“Just another dance,” he replied. “Keep smiling my dear.”_

_And he smiled again; his feet hurt, his stomach threatened to hurl and his mind screamed for him to stop but he carried on and kept smiling._

“I don’t know why he came to an Asian fusion restaurant to order classic Italian-.”

“Amatriciana,” Bucky whispered, barely paying the man attention.

“You know him?” the man asked. “He’s not coming back is he?”

Bucky didn’t answer; he was too busy trying to breathe as he walked away from the table before he headed out of the restaurant. 

Once outside his eyes darted all around him, fearing that somehow he was around. He couldn’t let him get to him; he couldn’t go through all that again. This wasn’t real, he was dead, he _saw_ him die.

His eyes roamed everywhere as he started hyperventilating. 

He was still alive. He was here, and he could be anywhere. He could take hold of him again, make him do things he didn’t want to; turn him back into a puppet.

_"Shlof shoyn mayn-"_

His mind screamed for him to sing to calm himself down.

_"Shlof shoyn-"_

Damn it, he couldn’t sing! He couldn’t breathe, he couldn’t think anymore!

_"Shlof shoyn mayn-"_

He took deep and harsh breaths, his eyes looking all around him, and his legs moving on their own. His mind could only work enough to get him out of there, it knew he couldn’t stay there, he had to get as far away as he could. 

He began to walk in a fast pace, then he started trotting, then sprinting until he began to run as fast as he could, uncaring of where he ended up at, just that he couldn’t stay there any longer.

Only one thought assaulted his mind: Karpov was alive.

~~~~~

He didn’t know how he managed it but he eventually reached Avenger’s tower and headed straight to the top floors. Once there he stomped through the elevator doors finding King T’Chaka already there. Good, it saved him the trouble of finding him. He was speaking to the rest of the Avengers, about what, he didn’t care; he only approached them, his breaths finally calmed down.

They all looked at him in surprise, some, mainly the king, in hope. So much for finding T’Challa before there was no hope.

“Hello Mr. Barnes,” he said, his voice and face looked so expectant. It nearly broke Bucky, but he couldn’t worry about that right now. He had to know.

“Who referred me?” he asked both him and Steve, ignoring everyone else. “Was it Nick Fury?”

The king and Steve looked to each other in confusion before Steve answered, “He told me about you, but I didn’t decide to hire you.”

“I did,” T’Chaka continued. “Fury wasn’t there when I went to see him. I chatted with a man and only told him that I needed someone for a case, he said he had seen you work cases for Fury and that you would be perfect for a job. Fury confirmed it afterwards to both me and Rogers.”

Bucky breathed, trying so hard not to panic in front of them all, “What did he look like?”

“White man, blonde, in his forties or fifties, and he had a Russian accent.”

That sent Bucky’s blood running cold, his limbs shook and he could barely breathe.

With shaky breaths he replied, “Go, get out of the country, go back to Wakanda and don’t come back!”

“What do you mean?!” T’Chaka demanded desperately but Bucky began to walk away. “Who is this man?! Does he have my son?!”

Bucky ignored him; he couldn’t help him anymore.

He ignored all their calls; he just opened the elevator door and punched the button to go down. He only saw Steve running toward the doors before they closed.

Once the elevator began to move he backed into the wall, thumping against it before sliding down and burying his hands over his head. 

“I’m sorry,” he breathed, tears running down his cheeks as his breaths came out ragged. “I’m so sorry.”

~~~~~

Sam sent him text messages and he called, but Bucky kept ignoring him. 

He bit his lip as he looked at the final text: _steve called me again, god damn it please answer!_

He breathed heavily before he crushed the phone in his metal hand, he had already made his ticket to Romania, he was leaving indefinitely. He couldn’t stay, not even for Sam.

“I’m sorry Sam,” he whispered as he resumed packing. 

He only left a letter to Sam, knowing he would come by the apartment later. In it he only said he had to go, he told him to keep an eye on Wanda and that he was sorry. There was really not much else he could say.

A part of him told him he couldn’t just leave Sam; not Sam, the man still needed him. But he had to because no one was safe around him. He had to disappear before Karpov found out about him. 

He returned to packing, ignoring the voice in his head telling him not to do this to Sam, when he heard someone come in. He reached for a gun he had under his bed and aimed it at the door to his room.

Steve stood there, arms raised in defense, “Woah, woah, easy!”

Bucky nearly growled, lowering the gun, “God damn it, I could’ve shot you!”

“I’m sorry, I just-.” Steve stopped talking as soon as he saw the bag Bucky was packing, “…So you’re just going to run!?”

“Is it obvious?!” Bucky spat, shoving his clothes into a suitcase.

“You can’t do this!” Steve yelled, but Bucky tried his best to ignore him. “Look, I don’t know what’s going on but I do know King T’Chaka’s son is probably in danger. This is the future king of a nation we’re talking about!”

“That’s not my problem anymore; tell him he can keep his damn money.” 

“You think he cares about the money?! He wants his _son_!”

Bucky stopped packing for a bit turning to glare at Steve, “Why’d you decide to hire me?” Steve was confused by that but Bucky didn’t care, “I know it was the king who said he wanted to do it, but he sent you. Why did you do it?”

Steve’s jaw twitched and he breathed through his nose, his eyes glaring into Bucky’s, “Because I was told you were a good person, at first I wasn’t sure but then I saw it. I saw you doing everything to find T’Challa, I saw you defending a young girl from an asshole.”

Bucky nearly laugh at him before he closed the distance and took Steve’s lips in his own. The kiss was forced, rough and short, Steve struggled a bit before Bucky parted.

“You saw what you wanted to,” Bucky sneered. “This is me. That kiss there, I know you would’ve wanted to get it once you took me out, got to know me. But now you do; now you know I’m an asshole who doesn’t give a damn about anyone but himself.”

Steve looked at him in surprised, even hurt when he spoke. That was good, he need him hurt, it was easier for the man to hate him and want him gone for good. He continued, he didn’t care if it hurt him in the process as well. He needed Steve to realize who he really was, and maybe tell Sam about it too.

“I take the sob cases because they’ll get me good cash from Fury and the ones involved, I helped that girl because I want to ease my conscience, and I sleep with my best friend to make myself feel better. So you see Rogers, I only do things for myself, no one else. And if the going gets tough I get going in the opposite direction, so do me a favor and fuck off!”

He turned away, wanting that to be the end of it, and resumed packing while ignoring the tears that wanted to come to his eyes.

“You’re lying,” Steve stated but Bucky paid no attention. “You’re running but not because you’re selfish, it’s because you’re scared.”

“Either way, I’m leaving!”

“So that’s it?”

Bucky stopped when he heard the second voice, cursing his luck, and turned to face Sam who was at the door.

“You’re going to leave,” Sam continued. “Forget without saying goodbye, you were going to leave a man, possibly to die.” 

Bucky looked away from Sam, feeling more shame than ever before, but he couldn’t let it get to him. Sam was not going to make him stay; he needed to get away from Karpov. 

“I’m not a hero,” Bucky muttered turning back to him, his eyes begging him to leave, to give up on someone who’s not worth it. “I’m not. Whatever it is you think you saw in me, it’s a lie! I’m not the man you think I can be!”

“Yes you can damn it!” Sam yelled, stubborn as always. “You’re lying about everything you said! You _are_ the hero I know you can be! I know because you’ve helped people, you’ve helped _me_!” 

Steve watched the exchange until both of them fell silent, Bucky looking away again and Sam glaring at him stubbornly. He believed Sam, not Bucky. He had seen Bucky do what was right because he wanted to, not because he could get something out of it.

The silence stretched on before Steve sighed, getting Bucky’s attention when he spoke, “Look, you can go ahead and run if you want but if you don’t do something a man could lose his son forever, and that’s going to be on you. Do you want to live with that?”

“I don’t want to live with myself yet here I am,” Bucky muttered, much to Sam’s dismay. It was something Bucky never wanted to admit to him, because he knew how Sam would feel.

“It seems a little unfair,” Sam muttered. “I didn’t want to live with myself either, and yet there you were.”

Bucky said nothing; he only clenched his jaw and resumed packing. He tried to blink through the tears in his eyes but they wouldn’t stop, he couldn’t get the damn clothes to fit. He couldn’t look at either Sam or Steve. He had to leave!

Steve watched him, crestfallen, “Please don’t run, we still need you to find him, he could be hurt.”

“I don’t care!” Bucky growled trying to shove his clothes into the suitcase but ended up making them fall over the side of his bed, like everything else in his life they fell apart. He ran his hands through his hair, now trying to choke back some sobs. He just wanted to leave, he couldn’t face him. He was his worst nightmare come to life and Bucky just wanted to run away from it. He didn’t want to go back to being his toy.

Steve looked at him in sympathy; he knew the man didn’t mean it when he said he didn’t care, he was just scared, and Steve couldn’t imagine what it was that made him that way. He only guessed that Bucky knew the person who took T’Challa. Whatever that man had done to him left him scared and vulnerable. Perhaps it was selfish of Steve to ask for much, it was selfish to ask him to face this threat.

“Tell me where he is,” Steve suggested, to Bucky’s and Sam’s surprise.

“What?” Bucky asked.

“Tell me where to find him, you can leave and never have to deal with this ever again. I’ll go get him myself, and you can run as far as you want.”

“You can’t, he’ll get you too,” Bucky argued, wiping his face. 

“That’s a risk I’m willing to take,” Steve stated confidently.

“God damn it Rogers, this isn’t jumping around buildings and stopping disasters, this is someone who _can_ hurt you!”

“I don’t care!” Steve yelled. “I’m going to do this because it’s the right thing, because it’s my friend who’s in danger! And maybe I’ll fail but that’s not going to stop me! Not when there’s someone who needs me!”

Bucky looked at him with wide eyes, this man was willing to face some unknown foe just because he thought it was right. He should’ve expected it from Captain America, but still he couldn’t believe how incredibly selfless he was. He was a true hero, unlike him, he was just a coward.

“I’m going too,” Sam stated.

“Sam?” Bucky asked, looking at him pleadingly.

“I think I’ve had enough of my comfy life, it’s time I go ahead and do something with it.”

“Sam please!”

“Riley’s gone,” Sam shrugged. “Nothing I can do about that. If I can do something about this, I should. You helped me because you thought I was worth it, now I’m doing the same for someone else.”

Bucky looked at him in despair, he looked from both Sam to Steve and saw only two fucking idiots. They were getting into something neither of them was ready to face, not with Sam’s military record, not with Steve’s enhanced abilities. They were probably not going to come out of it unscathed but they didn’t seem to care, they weren’t like Bucky, they were good people. 

There they were looking expectantly, they didn’t blame him anymore. It seemed they understood why he wanted to leave but they wouldn’t do the same thing.

He angrily threw his suitcase at the wall, running his hands through his hair, gasping desperately.

Steve and Sam looked at each other carefully, waiting for Bucky who ended up collapsing on the bed and taking deep breaths, singing something under his breath. They may not have known each other but they knew Bucky, Steve at least partially, so they knew to wait. 

After a few minutes Bucky’s breathing had evened, he wiped his face with his sleeve and addressed Steve. “Call King T’Chaka,” he softly ordered. Steve didn’t hesitate to do so and didn’t even argue when Bucky yanked the phone from his hand as soon as he dialed.

Bucky listened to the phone ring for a bit before he heard the king answer, “Rogers?”

“Your highness it’s Barnes.”

“What’s going on, where’s my son?!”

“Please calm down sir, I apologize for my behavior earlier but I need to know, do you have any meetings, anything you have to attend?”

“Yes, but I can cancel right away!”

“No, whatever you do, you need to act as if nothing’s out of the ordinary, I don’t want to risk alerting this man to anything so just behave normally…I’ll get you your son back.” 

“Thank you, thank you so much!”

Bucky bit his lip, he didn’t want the man to thank him so he carried on, “I’ll have Steve notify you when we find him, in the meantime stay with the Dora Milaje and the Avengers, and don’t talk to anyone you don’t know especially the man who referred me.”

“Very well.”

“If you see him, don’t let the Avengers or even the Dora Milaje engage, just get the hell out of there.”

“Understood.”

“Thank you.”

With that said he hung up the phone, put his jacket on, hid his gun inside the inner gun hostler and headed out. 

Steve and Sam looked at each other briefly before following him.

“Where are we going?” Steve asked as he guided them to his ride, a car this time. 

“Uptown, 59th and 5th,” Bucky muttered climbing into the shotgun seat. 

Steve and Sam got in as well and when they were seated, Steve wasted no time in driving. 

The drive was quiet, with only Sam looking at Bucky occasionally. There were so many things he wanted to ask him, but now wasn’t the time. He honestly didn’t know when the time would be but that would be up to Bucky. Just because he was constantly there for Bucky didn’t mean Bucky owed him anything. He didn’t owe Bucky anything either, he just trusted him, maybe Bucky would do the same for him someday.

They finally reached a lavish hotel, where the doorman actually greeted Bucky by name but neither Sam nor Steve asked anything about it, they only followed Bucky. They made their way to the 37th floor and down a hall.

Here Bucky slowed down, he was sweating so much and he was doing everything he could to keep his gun steady as he took it out. With every step his nerves wracked him, but he couldn’t turn back, not now. 

Images came back, of him being guided through this hallway and toward that room, tired and drunk; he was taken to the room for Karpov to have his fun. He told him to say he loved it, and to keep smiling.

The reminder made him stop and take deep breaths, leaning against the wall for support.

“Bucky?” Sam asked as he and Steve made a move to aide him but were unsure how.

“Pull the fire alarm.” Bucky replied, taking deep breaths.

Sam did so, once the alarm sounded they watched as everyone exited, heading straight toward the exit. There was only one door that remained shut, and Bucky maintained his eyes on it as he composed himself.

“No one’s opened that door,” Steve observed.

Bucky didn’t say anything and moved toward it, his gun ready.

Once they reached it, the three surrounded the door. Steve and Sam stood to the sides as Bucky aimed his gun at it before kicking it down, holding his gun up. He tensed in dreaded anticipation and waited for any movement. When he saw no one he gulped a little before moving forward, inspecting the inside. Steve followed him while Sam stayed behind; picking up a nearby vase as a weapon in case anyone came. 

As he and Steve ventured into the room, Bucky spotted the champagne bottles on the table along with leftovers from a dinner, just like that time. He turned away and was about to turn a corner before Steve stopped him, picking up a candle holder as a weapon and then nodded. Bucky nodded as well before he rounded the corner aiming the gun. He was only met with an empty hallway that led to that room, the room where the man tormented and violated him. He shook for a second as he saw light coming from that room before he moved forward, until he reached the door and opened it. What he saw reminded him of that time, except this time it was someone else on the bed.

Steve stepped past Bucky and into the room, recognizing T’Challa lying on the bed. Relief flooded him and he moved to go toward him but was stopped by Bucky.

“Is he here?” Bucky asked the man.

T’Challa didn’t answer for a while, barely seemed to acknowledge him, he just stared at the clock on the nightstand.

“No,” he eventually gulped.

“How long has he been gone?” Bucky asked.

“Five hours and twenty-one minutes.” T’Challa replied, eyes still fixed on the clock.

Steve didn’t wait any longer and began to walk cautiously toward him, “T’Challa?”

“Steve?” the man gasped, his voice sounded so relieved it made Bucky’s gut twist.

“It’s okay, I’m here,” Steve reassured. “We’re getting you out of here.”

Steve moved to get some of T’Challa’s clothes, unable to look at how the man was only wearing a tank top and underwear.

Bucky lowered his gun and holstered it, gulping as he remembered how he was once in that same position. 

“Come on,” Steve urged, placing the clothes on T’Challa’s bed as he dug through some drawers for anything that might allow him to identify the kidnapper.

“I can’t,” T’Challa choked.

Steve turned to him in question, he didn’t want to, but he inspected his friend's body with his eyes to find any injuries. He was confused when he saw none, but Bucky knew what was going on.

“He told you not to move,” Bucky said, it wasn’t a question because he already knew the answer. He remembered all too well how he was left the same way; he knew all too well the smell from the sheets.

T’Challa licked his lips, and now that Bucky got a good look at him he saw that there were tear tracks down his eyes.

“I wet the bed,” T’Challa admitted shamefully.

Steve clenched his fists and jaw in anger; if he ever found the man who did this to his friend he was going to kill him. 

“Help me dress him,” Bucky said to Steve who moved to do just that. “Sam how’s it looking over there?!”

“No one here yet,” Sam called back. “But I don’t want to take any chances, move!”

Once they managed to properly dress T'Challa they started to pull him away from the bed, that’s when the man started to struggle.

“No! NO!” he yelled pulling away from them.

“T’Challa we have to go!” Steve yelled, tugging him along with Bucky from the bed but the man clenched at the sheets and kicked at them as they dragged him away from the bed.

“No! Let go of me! I can’t leave! No! No! NO!” he yelled. He managed to pull himself free from them and crawl back toward the bed. Steve looked to Bucky, unsure of what to do, but he followed Bucky’s lead and both hastened to pull T’Challa away again. The man kept struggling and it took all their effort to get him off the bed.

“Let’s go, now!” Bucky grunted as they hauled him, Steve grabbing him by the arms while Bucky grabbed the legs to stop him from kicking.

“STOP! NO! I CAN’T LEAVE! I CAN’T LEAVE! LET ME GO! I CAN’T LEAVE!” the man cried desperately, his words hurting Bucky more than he knew. He kept struggling until they exited the suite, still his words rung in Bucky's ears.

Once they got outside Sam helped them as they left the building through the stairs. They managed to get him into Steve’s car where he just stared out the window. Sam sat in the back with him and watched him, just in case. Steve was completely silent, only griping the steering wheel so hard that he had to stop himself when it started to bend.

Bucky gulped as he kept looking back at T’Challa, he knew all too well how the man felt. “You’re gonna be okay,” he whispered. The man didn’t pay attention but Bucky didn’t mind. He knew better than to think he would be completely fine but at least he would be away from that monster.

~~~~~

They were finally at the tower, where T’Challa had collapsed on the couch while shaking. Bucky stood with his arms crossed, looking out the window and occasionally at Steve as he called the Avengers and King T’Chaka.

“It’s gonna be okay. Do you remember me? We worked together once,” Sam asked trying to distract T’Challa as the man continued to tremble. Sam licked his lips. “…Don’t worry, you’re safe now.” 

Bucky couldn’t bear to hear how Sam tried to comfort the man and so focused on Steve, who seemed to finally reach King T’Chaka.

“Yes he’s here,” Steve said over the phone. “…Yes he’s alright for the most part…he’ll need medical checkup but Barnes suggests you get him out of the country before anything…yes of course sir, tell Tony to make sure the lobby is clear and close the elevators for anyone, leave the Dora Milaje there just in case, instruct them to not let anyone even _near_ them, if someone besides you and T’Challa gets out of the elevator they need to assume they’re a threat…I can’t explain sir, I don’t know much myself but Barnes suggest it’s better to just go in and out …yes sir, don’t worry he’s safe now. We’ll be waiting.”

Steve hung up the phone, turning to Bucky who asked, “They’ll be here soon?”

“Yeah, King T’Chaka has already readied a plane for them, they’ll be out of the country soon enough.”

“Good, the sooner he gets out of here the better,” Bucky mumbled.

“He…he made me do things,” T’Challa stuttered, making Bucky and Steve turn to him in surprise, seeing as it was the first time he spoke since they arrived. “…That I didn’t want to do but, I wanted to.”

Bucky clenched his fingers on his arm, which Steve noticed but said nothing. He still didn’t understand much of what was happening. 

“It’s okay, take deep breaths, just inhale,” Sam urged the man, offering what little support he could that he had learned from going to VA meetings. “And hold it, just keep holding it until you can’t and exhale.”

T’Challa held it for a moment before he exhaled; he repeated the process with Sam’s guidance.

“I didn’t want to…I didn’t want to do those things,” T’Challa muttered, his breathing even but his limbs still shaking.

Bucky turned away from him. He couldn’t look at the man without seeing himself; he wondered if that was how he had looked, if T’Challa had also felt like he was a passenger in his own body, but most of all he wondered if T’Challa would be as broken as everyone Karpov ensnared, like Bucky.

He took a deep breath before turning to the prince and walked toward him until he crouched next to the man.

“T’Challa, listen to me,” he said catching his attention. “Whatever you did, whatever he made you do, it wasn’t your fault.”

T’Challa nodded.

“Say it,” Bucky urged. “Say it wasn’t your fault.”

T’Challa gulped and took deep breaths, before he replied, “It wasn’t my fault.”

“Good, that’s good,” Bucky said, smiling in encouragement.

Bucky felt Sam’s eyes on him but couldn’t bring himself to meet his gaze; he was leaving Sam after this, so there was no point in even looking at him. He retreated to where Steve stood, without sparing his friend a glance.

Sam looked back to T’Challa, “Hey, at the VA, if someone gets a panic attack we tell them a joke, it helps. Do you want to hear one?”

T’Challa seemed to consider this for a while before he nodded.

Sam smiled, “Knock, knock.”

“Who’s there?”

“Doris.”

“Doris who?”

“Door is locked that’s why I’m knocking.”

T’Challa cracked a small smile, as a tear slipped from his eye.

Steve watched the interaction, not knowing what else to do. There wasn’t much he _could_ do to help his friend and that frustrated him beyond belief. He just wanted to find the man who did this to him and make him pay. He wanted to beat his face and say that it was for hurting T’Challa.

“Don’t go after him,” Bucky said, snapping him out of his thoughts.

“Who is he?” Steve asked evenly but Bucky recognized anger in his voice. 

“He’s someone even you can’t deal with,” Bucky answered. “He controls people, treats them like puppets and makes them do whatever he wants them to.”

“How do you know him?” Steve asked, almost afraid of what he would say. It was a good thing Bucky didn’t seem to want to answer, Steve didn’t blame him, plus it didn’t take a genius to figure out the answer. “Thank you,” he sighed and meant it.

Bucky didn’t acknowledge it; he kept his eyes to the window. 

Sam hadn’t made much progress with his jokes besides a soft laugh from T’Challa, luckily the elevator doors opened and in came T’Chaka along with Tony, Rhodey, Natasha and Clint. The elder man, upon seeing his son, rushed toward them.

T’Challa’s eyes emitted fresh tears, “Baba!” he called running toward the man. Once they met they embraced in a loving hug. T’Challa cried on the man’s shoulder and the elder man laid kisses upon his forehead.

“My son!” T’Chaka cried in pure joy. “My son!”

“It wasn’t my fault, I didn’t mean it!” T’Challa explained, crying like a child who did something wrong without meaning to. “I’m sorry! I’m so sorry baba!”

“It’s alright my son, it’s alright, I’m here now!” the man assured him, running his hands in comfort over T’Challa’s back as the man sobbed into his shoulder.

The rest of the Avengers watched with relief and smiles on their faces.

“Well done Barnes.” 

It was Natasha who spoke but Bucky didn’t acknowledge her. He couldn’t care less if she started treating him less like a threat; he just wanted to get out of there, he needed the Wakandans to get out of there first.

“I can understand this is a lot to take in but you need to get out of the country and fast,” Bucky insisted, hating to break up their moment but he needed them to leave.

“What happened?” T’Chaka asked.

“Is there something wrong?” it was Rhodey who spoke, putting the others on alert.

“We’ll explain later,” Steve answered. “Right now you need to get your son as far away from here as you can.”

“Yes we need to leave,” T’Challa mumbled hurriedly.

“Don’t worry; we’re going home to your mother and sister. We’re going home,” T’Chaka reassured his son, kissing his face one last time before looking at the Avengers, uncaring of the tears running down his face or the fact that he no longer held himself like the proud king he was, he was just overjoyed to have his son back.

“Thank you so much for this,” T’Chaka said to them all before his eyes settled on Bucky. “Thank you Barnes.”

Bucky felt his gut clench at that, he only gulped as he met the king’s gaze.

“I mean it,” T’Chaka continued. “If there is anything you should need, Wakanda itself is in your debt.”

Bucky smiled sheepishly, the feeling of joy in his gut unfamiliar to him, he had reunited a man with his son and by the look of Sam and the Avengers they were proud of him. It was an odd feeling, and one that he didn’t deserve.

“Thank you,” T’Challa said as well, and before he knew it, Bucky was embraced by the man. The action made him tense but to his surprise it gave him comfort. He wondered if this is what Sam talked about, about being the hero he saw him as. 

He knew he was no hero, but apparently T’Challa thought so and he confirmed it when he whispered, “You saved me.”

“…Just take care,” Bucky muttered and patted him awkwardly, not knowing what else to do.

T’Challa and T’Chaka gave them all their thanks one last time before they made their way to the elevator. Once they did that Bucky was congratulated by the others, and he was shocked when Sam hugged him. 

“I told you,” he whispered against Bucky’s ear, making Bucky smile. 

It appeared he was forgiven by Sam, he still planned to leave, but at least Sam wouldn’t hate him. Now with the case over he could still catch his flight and get away, everything would be fine.

“Nice job Barnes!”

“You did good!”

“You really came through!”

The amount of praises actually made Bucky blush, but he ignored them all in favor of watching T’Challa leave with his father. Maybe he wasn’t the piece of shit he thought he was. At least T’Challa didn’t think so.

But things never worked out for Bucky.

He realized that when T’Challa turned to him from inside the elevator, he was no longer relieved or happy to be with his father, his gaze was blank. Bucky frowned at that when suddenly he felt something missing, he looked down to see that it was his gun.

The world seemed to slow down, the others asked what was wrong with him but he only looked back to T’Challa from inside the elevator.

His eyes widened remembering how T’Challa had not wanted to leave the hotel room, how he desperately fought to leave, and how he had just embraced him. 

Suddenly he saw it, T’Challa raised Bucky’s gun just as the elevator doors began to close.

“NO!” he yelled running toward the elevator but it was too late. 

The doors closed just as he reached them and the gunshots sounded. He banged on the doors desperately but the shots still rang.

“Shit! Stop the elevator!” Rhodey called to Tony as the others ran after Bucky.

“It’s stopped on the 47th floor.” Tony yelled in panic eyeing his watch.

Bucky didn’t hesitate to run down the stairs and toward the floor, followed by the others.

The shots continued to ring as they raced down, until the sounds sounded no more.

They made their way through one of Tony’s labs where they had to dart past people toward the elevator. Bucky and Steve reached it first and pulled the doors apart. Nothing could've ever prepared them for what they saw.

They watched in horror as King T’Chaka’s body lay on the floor, covered in blood and bullet holes.

Steve stepped away, feeling his throat clog at the sight of the body and smell of blood. Sam nearly collapsed and had to lean against a pillar. Tony had to turn away, feeling bile rise to his mouth. Rhodey stood shaking, unable to get closer or do anything else. Clint held Natasha when the woman’s legs wobbled, an unconscious effort to distract himself from his ragged breaths. 

Bucky could only stare at the body with his brain running in frenzy, unable to comprehend how this was real. But it was, he could tell by the stench and the pints of blood that poured out on the elevator floor. He felt tears run down his cheeks as he turned his horrified gaze from the body to look at the other person in the elevator.

T’Challa didn’t stop pulling the trigger despite there being no more bullets, his body was sprayed with blood, and when he saw Bucky he had a cruel look and a wicked grin.

“Smile,” he said, much to Bucky’s horror.

He stepped back from the elevator and from the body, unable to grasp what had just happened. He only knew that he did this, he did this to them. It was his fault. He was to blame. That monster did this to them because of him.

Meanwhile, inside the elevator, T’Challa seemed to finally snap out of his trance. He looked at the gun in confusion before his eyes saw the man on the ground. Realizing what he had done, he dropped the gun and fell against the elevator wall. His throat emitted soft wines as he reached his hands out to the man before he let out a loud wail, holding onto his father’s bloodied corpse.

“BABA! BABA! BABA!” he shouted while sobbing as he cradled the body in his arms.

His cries followed Bucky with every step he took away from the scene, uncaring of the crowd gathering and horrified whispers and yells. He just left the place, unable to bear it any longer. His legs took him out of the floor and toward the staircase where he finally released his stomach contents.

He did this, it was his fault.

He had to leave now, otherwise Karpov would get to him. He would find him or maybe do the same to someone else. He couldn't let him do this to someone else, this was his tormentor and because of him a man had just killed his father.

It was his fault.

…But not T’Challa’s.

He turned back to the inside of the floor, seeing a crowd gathering. There were lights flashing, they must be taking pictures. They were capturing the images of a man who, for all they knew, had just murdered his father.

He could leave, catch his flight to Romania and never come back; but where would that leave T’Challa? He would be strung up by the public, be branded a murderer and a traitor to his country. He’d be condemned for killing someone he loved when he wasn’t at fault.

He remembered something similar with Sam, it was a different situation but at the same time similar. Sam had needed him, and Bucky didn’t abandon him. Sam had been his responsibility then, like T’Challa was now.

No, he wouldn’t leave. He might have to face his worst nightmares all over again, but he couldn’t leave T’Challa when it was Bucky’s fault this happened. He couldn't run anymore. He was scared but he had to make Karpov pay, because while Bucky deserved shit, T’Challa didn’t. He deserved to go home to his family.

With that in mind he spit the remaining vile out and headed back inside. He ignored the rest of the people and met eyes with Sam, then Steve and then with each Avenger; they were still in shock but looked to him with determination. 

To be honest Bucky didn’t know what he would do, but now he had allies to help him figure it out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah, I deserve to go to hell for this chapter. Oh well, this was fun to write so I hope you liked it, if you want to come scream at me: [tumblr](http://crimson-waterlily.tumblr.com/)
> 
> Happy sorrow, it'll probably get worse :P


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The aftermath of King T'Chaka's death, Bucky proceeds to investigate but at the same time allienate himself from everyone else, including Sam.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: no warnings for this chapter.
> 
> This chapter was a NIGHTMARE to write, but all things considered I think it turned out good. I really hate Fox news. Also, I don't know much about Christine save for the first IM movie, all I know is that she's somewhat against superheroes. I decided to add Aneka to the main group cause I fell in love with her character when I began to write her.

The news was everywhere, no matter how much Bucky tried to ignore it, every single headline read: The King of Wakanda murdered by his own son.

There was no way around it.

Even as he showered to clear his thoughts the words haunted him, but no more than the scene itself. God, there was so much blood. It was a sight he had hoped to get away from for good. For the past few days he kept waking up because he could still smell the blood in his dreams.

He remembered how Steve explained to the rest of the Avengers everything they needed to know, and they had all managed to clear the area from prying eyes. Tony knew he would be unable to keep the footage from the public, especially with the people having taken the photos, but he could at least kill the cameras in the building long enough to get T’Challa out of there.

Rhodey had called the Dora Milaje and explained the situation, they took the sight hard but eventually their leader, Aneka, helped T’Challa escape. He hated seeing how she had to drag the prince away from the body while he continued to scream and sob for his father. Now she was his accomplice and both were “on the run”, meanwhile the other two remained while the authorities arrived and explained that both T’Challa and their leader had fled after fighting them along with the Avengers off. The actions they had all taken were necessary, there was enough footage to condemn T’Challa, and the Avengers couldn’t be seen implicated with him.

And Bucky? He was the one who told them what to do, he got them to help him and it worked. At the moment T’Challa was safe at Avengers Tower, and no one knew about it, not even Karpov could know. He had to keep it that way. But there was a problem; while the Avengers were useful, like everyone around Bucky they would be in danger.

 _Sam_ would be in danger.

Bucky had stayed with Sam for the past few nights, mostly to make sure the guy wouldn’t have a relapse. Bucky made sure he ate, got him to take a shower and constantly assured him it wasn’t his fault. That was Sam, he would constantly blame himself for not being able to help someone; Riley’s death had made sure of that.

When Bucky gave him breakfast that morning Sam only ate absentmindedly, and at one point he whispered, “I was just there to watch.” That broke Bucky’s heart more than anything.

He groaned and ran a hand through his hair as he stood in front of the mirror, looking at his reflection like it would give him the answers. He desperately needed answers because he just couldn’t understand why that asshole was still alive.

How did Karpov cheat death?

He had done it somehow; Bucky just had to figure out how. He wasn’t sure how that would help him, or T’Challa, but it was a start.

But one thing was for certain; whatever he did, it wouldn’t help Sam.

With that in mind he got dressed and left a note for a napping Sam before he left, it only read: _Stay away._

~~~~~

“A crime like this is something we should’ve all seen coming, especially because this is very common in African cultures, they kill their predecessors to take control, it’s because they’re isolated from normal human interaction and live according to tribal gods.”

Steve turned the channel in anger, he fucking hated Fox news.

It wasn’t any better in the rest of the channels though, none of them had much good to say about what had happened, even if they didn’t bring up T’Challa’s skin color or cultural background. He couldn’t say he was surprised, what else did it look like but a man killing his father? There were enough eyewitnesses in the floor where the elevator stopped, and even Tony couldn’t keep them all quiet. The Avengers couldn’t exactly say what really happened; none of them had proof except for their word, and even _they_ didn’t know the full story. It would be especially bad if the public found out they were hiding the murderer.

He turned the channel again, this time it was to Christine Everhart’s channel, one of the few that didn’t bring up anything based on race. Though Christine was firm in her beliefs that many superheroes were dangerous, she believed in fairness above all else, so she wasn’t so quick to judge when it came to criminals, but right now it was difficult for her to be open-minded; there was no evidence of this being anything but premeditated murder.

The news was of a conference where Queen Ramonda stood alongside Princess Shuri. Steve didn’t want to see this, but he had to, it was the least he could do when these two women were in pain. He had no right to look away.

“Today we grieve the loss of a king, a father, and a husband…” Queen Ramonda spoke, her voice sounding clogged. “A man who placed the safety and wellbeing of his people and his family above all else. A man who we were proud to call King of Wakanda.”

Shuri placed a hand on her mother’s shoulder in reassurance and addressed the audience to give the older woman a chance to catch her breath.

“We will receive the remains in three days for the burial,” the princess continued. “And we thank all our subjects who have shown us kindness and support. We will not let this tragedy hinder us, we will stand strong and accept my father’s passing with the dignity he would’ve wanted.”

Ramonda smiled to Shuri before she resumed speaking, “My husband shall be honored as the great man I knew him to be…As for the traitor who killed him and the one who assisted in his escape, they will either return to Wakanda prisoners or not at all.”

Steve knew Queen Ramonda well enough to know that the decision she had just stated pained her greatly, but it had to be done.

He had called to inform the two of everything, but also had to admit that none of them had any proof to clear T’Challa’s name. He couldn’t even begin to imagine the heartache they felt when he told them they couldn’t see their son and brother, all he could do was promise them that he would do whatever it took to help T’Challa.

So in the end, Ramonda was forced to act as queen and forget that she was a mother.

“There you have it folks, a heartbreaking moment of a mother having to denounce her son,” Christine said as the camera cut back to her. “The news is circulating the internet with theories as to why the prince committed this action. The FBI as well as several intelligence agencies around the world are collaborating in the continued search for the whereabouts of Prince T’Challa. It’s certainly a tragedy that’s shocked this nation and most of the world and I think all we can do is hope that he doesn’t hurt anyone else and comes back to face justice.”

He decided to turn off the TV, not knowing what else to do. He ran a hand over his eyes, feeling more tired than usual. He leaned back and looked out the window; too many thoughts circulated his head for him to focus on any one so he just sat there. He only snapped back to reality when he heard a knock on his door.

When he went to answer he found Okoye standing with a suitcase all set to leave. The woman had tear tracks in her eyes and he could only stand there and eye her with sympathy. He didn’t dare reach out, he knew her well enough to know that would only make her feel worse. She was one of the strongest people he knew and she hadn’t been able to do anything for her prince and king, he knew the thought must be killing her.

“I have to leave,” she whispered, her voice sounding choked.

He bit his lip and sighed, she was the last of the Dora Milaje to leave today. Some of the others had been either hesitant or too upset to leave, but in the end Aneka forced them to go; she wanted the queen and princess to have as many Dora Milaje as possible.

“I know,” he muttered.

Looking at her now, he saw how hurt and afraid she was. Right now she bled on the inside, and Steve wanted nothing more than to comfort her, but what could he do for her except oblige her request?

“Please help him,” she whispered.

Steve didn’t hesitate to nod and state, “We will, I promise.”

Okoye could only whisper a thank you before she moved to leave; letting Steve help her with her bag as they walked toward the main room. There, she found her leader staring out the window, her arms crossed and her stance was tall, but Okoye knew her well enough to know that she was trying to be strong for their prince.

“Excuse me for a moment,” she whispered to Steve who nodded and stayed by the door when she went toward Aneka.

Aneka made the decision. When the Avengers explained everything, they agreed one of them was to be branded a traitor as well. Aneka was the most experienced and their leader; it was her decision and would have no one else do this.

It just broke Okoye’s heart when she realized she would have to face Ayo without her lover.

She went over to her and stood near, catching the woman’s attention. When their eyes met they reached out to each other and hugged, Okoye couldn’t say how much she respected and admired Aneka for everything she was doing. Here she was, her friend and sister, putting herself on the line for her prince, so willing to protect both him and the rest of them. She wouldn’t let her sisters take this burden because she was their leader, and she needed to protect them. She wouldn’t abandon her prince no matter the circumstances, to her it didn’t matter how she would be branded a traitor as well. For them, Aneka was willing to sacrifice going back to the woman she loved.

“Come home,” Okoye whispered in her ear. “...Both of you.”

“We will,” Aneka said without hesitation. “Tell her that…and tell her I’m sorry.”

Okoye nodded once they parted, that was the end of that, it was time for her to go.

Steve bid Okoye one last farewell before the woman departed. Once she was gone he went toward Aneka who continued to look out the window.

“How are you holding up?” Steve asked.

“I’ll live.”

“Do you want to talk about it?”

Aneka briefly looked to him, taking a deep breath before she spoke, “As the leader of the Dora Milaje the responsibility of this falls to me, I must remain by his side even if it means I will be branded a traitor.”

“…You shouldn’t blame yourself,” Steve tried.

“I was supposed to protect him, and my King, I failed,” she argued.

“It wasn’t your fault,” their eyes snapped back to where Bucky walked in from. “Like it wasn’t his. I have good reason to believe Karpov got to you as well, he always plans ahead. I’m sure he considered you, and for that you shouldn’t blame yourself.”

Aneka scrutinized him, she didn’t know who this man was and she rarely trusted foreigners, especially white ones, but the Avengers told her about how he found her prince and how he tried to stop him. Perhaps she couldn’t trust him, but at this point she had no choice.

“You know him?” she asked.

“A while back he got me too, I thought he had died,” Bucky explained.

“Do you know his next move?” Steve asked.

“I can’t say, the only reason I was able to find T’Challa is because he wanted me to, right now I’m not sure what he wants.”

“So what do we do?” Aneka asked.

Bucky bit his lip, “As much as I hate to, I need to ask T’Challa some questions.”

“He’s in no condition to answer anything,” Aneka argued.

“I get that, but the longer we wait the more danger he and other people are in, if we don’t hurry we’ll have more things to worry about than T’Challa.”

Steve looked to Aneka for approval, she eyed him briefly before she signed and gestured for Bucky to follow her and Steve.

Bucky was surprised when they led him to medical room; the man was strapped to the bed and stared ahead with empty eyes.

Bucky frowned in confusion but nonetheless followed Steve and Aneka to where Clint, Natasha and Vision were currently looking through the window.

“How is he?” he asked Clint, who was closest to him.

Clint turned to him, just noticing their presence, and when he spoke his voice was flat but Bucky could detect anger in his voice, “Oh just peachy, yeah he should be starting to sing and dance any minute.”

“Be nice,” Natasha scolded in a soft voice, though making no real attempt to sound nice herself.

“It’s a stupid question.”

Bucky knew that.

“Where are Rhodes and Stark?” he asked instead.

“They’re at a press conference,” Vision replied.

“They saying anything in favor of T’Challa?”

“No, they’re just relating events and expressing condolences.”

“Good, if they don’t say anything then Karpov won’t suspect they know anything.”

He hated having to paint T’Challa as a villain, but it had to be done. If not then Karpov could probably control the Avengers as well to make them reveal T’Challa’s whereabouts, or worse.

He bit his lip as he stared at the man through the window and sighed before looking to Aneka, “Last chance, I’m not going in there unless you think it’s okay.”

Aneka kept her eyes on her charge, took a deep breath and then nodded.

Bucky whispered a thank you before he went in.

T’Challa didn’t even acknowledge him as he stepped inside, but Bucky didn’t push him. Now that he got a good look at him, he saw how the man had some bruises and scratches, most of them looked self-inflicted, no wonder they put him here. The straps were loose enough that he could have some free movement but they restricted him enough that he wouldn’t hurt himself too badly. The sight made Bucky’s gut clench, he sighed deeply and went to sit in the empty chair near the bed.

He had no idea how to begin his questioning, hell he didn’t know if T’Challa would even listen to him. He had no idea how to even start. He didn’t want to start asking anything and overwhelm the guy more than he was.

Here he was in front of a man who had lost everything and it was like being with himself, from a time when he was just a dead puppet with its strings cut. He knew all too well how that was, to be forced to do something against your will, to be forced to _want_ to do it, and when the puppet master let you go there was just a dull feeling, quickly followed by self-loathing. Here was a man who was just as broken as Bucky.

“…I just want you to know that everyone’s going to say they understand, they’re not trying to hurt you by saying that, they want to help, but you know they don’t understand anything…I want you to know that I do,” Bucky bit his lip, gulping as the memories resurfaced. “I understand better than anyone.”

T’Challa remained silent; of course Bucky didn’t expect otherwise. If it were up to him T’Challa would be allowed to mourn in peace, then again if it were up to him none of this would’ve happened, but he needed answers fast. T’Challa was broken, and he hated it, but if they didn’t hurry there would be more people like him.

“T’Challa I need your help here, you were the last person to see Karpov alive, did he tell you anything? Do you remember anything about the way he looked? Where he was headed? Who he met up with?”

Still nothing, the man only stared out the window.

Bucky sighed in resignation running a hand through his hair. He couldn’t expect much, when he was like this it took two weeks for him start talking. It took longer for him to not just want to disappear and never have to deal with what happened to him.

For that it was surprising when T’Challa spoke, “Are you a good swing dancer?”

Bucky’s eyes snapped back to T’Challa, his brows furrowed in confusion at the question.

“…He made me practice for _hours_ before he took me to the restaurant,” T’Challa continued, his voice sounding hoarse. “He said I wasn’t as good as you.”

Bucky eyes widened and he gulped, hating himself for the emotions he was going through.

“Did he tell you more about me?” he forced himself to say.

“He said you left him to die,” T’Challa muttered turning to glare at Bucky. “You should’ve stayed to make sure.”

Bucky avoided his gaze and muttered, “I’m sorry.”

“Why didn’t you stay?” T’Challa continued, his tone accusing. “Why didn’t you make sure he was dead?”

Because he had been afraid to see if he wasn’t; but he couldn’t say that to T’Challa. He had no right to say that it was because he wanted to get away so badly that he didn’t want to make sure Karpov was really dead. He had no right to tell him that because of his fear, Karpov had terrorized him as well.

“He said you left him there,” T’Challa continued.

“So he’s mad,” Bucky muttered, pushing his thoughts back and focusing only on his goal. “He wants me to suffer like he did, he was hurt from the accident. T’Challa if you can tell me anything, I need to know.”

“No.”

“Please, I need to stop him.”

“No!” T’Challa shook his head, and started tugging at the straps. “You can’t!”

“I have to.”

“He’ll control you!”

Outside Aneka’s hand went to the door, ready to help her prince.

“He’ll make you do things, horrible things!” T’Challa continued to yell.

“I won’t let him!” Bucky stated.

T’Challa looked at him in surprise, but Bucky remained firm, “I’m not going to let him.”

T’Challa shook his head as he started crying, “You won’t have a choice.”

As much as Bucky hated it, he knew T’Challa was right, still he stated firmly, “I won’t! I’m not going to let him get me again.”

“It won’t matter,” T’Challa sobbed. “It won’t matter. My father…my father. I did it, I did that. I killed him.”

Those words struck something within Bucky, they were a reminder. It was still T’Challa’s hands that murdered his father, just like they had been Bucky’s when he…did _that_.

There were so many of them, and every time it had been _his_ hands. There was no changing that. So why would that change in T’Challa’s eyes, or the public’s for that matter. It didn’t matter if he proceeded; T’Challa would still be considered a murderer, all because of Bucky.

He hated himself for walking out but he needed to; he needed to get some air, he needed to think, he needed to do _something_.

He didn’t pay attention to how Aneka ran past him to check on her prince, he ignored Steve and the others calling him. He headed toward the kitchen where he splashed water on his face and took deep breaths.

“Hey.”

Bucky jumped but relaxed when he saw Steve.

“Are you-?”

“I’m fine!” Bucky snapped. “I just…”

He took a deep breath, feeling like an asshole for letting this shit get to him when T’Challa was the one who was hurt the most. He just needed air, and he also needed to do something else. Whatever he did wouldn’t matter if T’Challa was guilty in everyone’s eyes, he wasn’t even sure how he was going to help him; he just had to get people off the man’s back in time for him to figure it out.

“I just need to make this right,” he growled before stomping away.

“Where are you going?” Steve called following him to the elevator, he was glad Stark had three of them because he didn’t want to step in the other one ever again.

“Look,” Bucky said in annoyance. “I need to talk to some people because whatever I do won’t matter, not if he’s a wanted man.”

“That doesn’t answer my question,” Steve said.

“Just sit tight; I’ll call you if I need anything!” Bucky snapped before going into the elevator and pushing the button for the lobby.

He knew he was being unfair to Steve and the Avengers; he was an asshole for it. He just couldn’t get them involved; it was a mistake to do so at first. Any involvement with them put them all in danger. He couldn’t do that to anyone else, not again.

So he had to work on his own now, unfortunately nothing he did would do any good if he didn’t get people to stop the manhunt for T’Challa.

He needed to see Fury.

~~~~~

“He’s guilty,” Fury stated as he drank a pill to relieve his headache. 

“We both know that’s not true,” Bucky muttered impatiently.

“Then by all means try explaining that to everyone else,” Fury replied, not looking at all happy since Bucky went into the office.

“We both know Karpov did this,” Bucky argued.

“And what do you want me to do?” Fury asked. “Appeal to the council for this? We have our orders to shoot on sight. He killed the King of Wakanda, even if he’s the prince, that and his skin color put him number one on the terrorist watch list.”

“He was being controlled, for fuck’s sake he was abducted. You can pull some strings if you’re convincing enough.”

“I can pull the strings below me, not above me; do you see this office on the top floor? Yes, he may have been abducted but do you think they’ll care about it when he was only missing for a few days? Should I say he was brainwashed?”

“Brainwashed, mind-controlled, whatever! I need someone to give him the benefit of the doubt! If you could help me, why the hell can’t you help him?!”

“You were a different case!” Fury yelled in anger.

Bucky knew Fury was angry but not at him, Fury was too noble to be angry at anyone but himself. He shut his mouth, immediately regretting how he yelled when he saw Fury run his hands over his face. The man was tired, that much was sure, and Bucky would bet his ass that his demands weren’t helping, the guy was sure to have a ton of shit to deal with.

“No one knew about you,” Fury said after a few breaths. “No one still does, it was easy to falsify some records for you. I reinvented you, I can’t do that for him, I don’t _want_ to do that for him, because I want that man back in his country with his family and his people. I don’t want him running around taking cases for me in the shadows. I want him to get his name cleared and that’s not going to happen because as far as anyone but us is concerned, Karpov isn’t real!”

Bucky’s pursed his lips, he knew Fury was right.

Seeing his face made Fury sigh, “I knew King T’Chaka, he was a good friend and one of the few existing monarchs who actually took care of his people and didn’t piss me off. And T’Challa, I knew him since he was a kid, I watched him grow and I know he’s a good man. So believe me, if there was anything I could do, I would…but there’s nothing either of us can do for him.”

Bucky eyed him with determination, “I can prove Karpov exists.”

That got an interested reaction from Fury, but at the same time skeptical, “How?”

“I’m resourceful, remember?”

Fury sighed and leaned back in his chair, running a hand over his chin in thought. His eye set somewhere off, probably thinking about what could be done with this, finally he said, “Look if you can get me something good I can appeal to the council with this, but it needs to be something solid.”

“How solid?”

“I don’t know.”

Bucky rolled his eyes, “Of course.”

Fury smiled at his expression before he looked at him seriously, “Listen Barnes, if you can manage this then I’ll owe you big time, I mean it.”

Bucky didn’t react to that he only headed out, calling behind him, “I’ll send you a box of kittens.”

Fury almost huffed a laugh and watched him leave, desperately hoping for things to work out. He wondered how on earth Bucky was going to get anything on Karpov when SHIELD had never been able to.

~~~~~

When Bucky entered his apartment he was surprised to find Sam there, then again he didn’t actually expect the guy to listen to his note.

“You know, you’re full of shit,” Sam said lowly.

“I left you a note,” Bucky shrugged. “Glad you followed the instructions.”

“You’re not just going to shut me out,” Sam argued.

Bucky glared at him and reached into one of his desk drawers and took out a folder which he handed to Sam. Sam took it roughly and looked inside to see a lot of money, some checks, and even credit cards. Now he was pissed, he licked his lips and breathed through his nose.

“What the fuck is this?”

“It’s money for you to move away,” Bucky answered bluntly. “I’ve been saving it up for you, just in case.”

“In case something came back to bite you in the ass?”

“Yep.”

“You know, I’ve never been more insulted in my life.”

“Well boohoo.”

Sam’s anger had diminished and now he looked desperate and scared, for Bucky, for their friendship.

“You can’t just shut me out, not like this.”

They both knew Bucky could, that’s what scared Sam the most. Bucky could easily cut all ties with him, if he thought it was the best thing for Sam.

“Look, why don’t you move in with me? We can work it out together; we’ll get the Avengers to help-.”

“I’m dumping them too,” Bucky cut in, rolling his eyes when he saw Sam’s look. “I can’t risk anyone, I realize that now. I’ll use them for info but if they get involved any further then they could be in danger, I can’t let that happen.”

“Are you fucking kidding me? They could help you way more than you can help yourself, and so can I. This guy is probably coming after you; you need a safer place to stay.”

“You think I’ll be safe!?” Bucky asked. “Sam, T’Challa is the prince of Wakanda, and look what happened to him, you think I’ll be safe with any of the Avengers, with you? I’m not safe anywhere. Every corner I turn I don’t know what’s on the other side, I don’t know _who’s_ on the other side. It could be the mailman, it could be one of the Avengers, it could be my landlord who was my best friend.”

Silence followed after that, both knew what Bucky was saying but still Sam couldn’t help but ask, “Was?”

Bucky gulped, the look of hurt on Sam’s face made him ache more than anything, a desperate voice screamed for him not to do this to his friend but he had to ignore it. His priority was keeping Sam safe.

“I’m a threat, so the best thing for you to do is to steer clear of me,” he said, trying not to choke.

Sam shook his head, while looking at him pleadingly, “You can’t ask that of me.”

“Please, I can’t risk you...Not you.”

Sam bit his lip, taking deep breaths and looking away.

“I’m sorry…but please go,” Bucky whispered, his voice unable to offer anymore.

Sam nodded, desperately trying to hold back his tears before he moved toward the door. He stopped briefly when he saw the broken door, remembering how it read Canary Investigations. He choked down his tears before he walked out, feeling the world crashing down around him. It wasn’t like the time with Riley, but it hurt all the same.

Bucky watched him go before he slumped down on his couch, running his hands through his head in frustration. He couldn’t do this to Sam but he couldn’t put him in danger either. This was for the best; he just had to keep telling himself that. There was no way he could ever convince himself that this was the best thing to do but he was full of shit, this wouldn’t be any different.

He just hated himself so much.

He shook those thoughts away and went to get his notebooks, not before grabbing a bottle of whisky to drink. He absentmindedly rubbed his left shoulder through his search, he hadn’t given his arm any maintenance but it could wait. It was a welcome distraction from what just happened with Sam, so he kept rubbing his shoulder as he dug through his backpack for the notebook he needed. He found it.

He skimmed through all his notes, trying his best to ignore all the other things. He was searching for that night, when it was over, or at least when he thought it was.

He found it:

 _January 21st, 2015_  
I left him.

There were the words that brought the memories back, of how he was able to walk away after so long.

_He remembered his metal hand smacked repeatedly against a skull, bashing it in. There was so much blood on his metal hand. He remembered walking away._

_“Get back here James!”_

_Karpov was yelling but he didn’t go back._

_“Now James!”_

He shook his head, he couldn’t dwell on that right now, he had to look through the notes. He ignored the parts that described how he felt and looked for specific details, finally he found the name of the street.

That was a start.

~~~~~

“We’re gonna tail him, aren’t we?” Natasha asked as she handed a cup of tea to Aneka.

The other woman took it gratefully, keeping her eyes on her charge.

“I’m not sure what we should do,” Steve replied.

“We can’t sit here and wait for him to tell us what he’s doing,” Aneka argued.

“We’re basically just waiting for any asshole to find him,” Clint agreed, referring to T’Challa.

“But we don’t know anything about what we’re facing, _who_ we’re facing,” Steve countered. “We can’t go and follow Bucky just like that, he’s not our enemy. This Karpov guy is. And if he got T’Challa, how better off are the rest of us gonna be?”

They were silent, no arguments there. T’Challa was one of the strongest people they knew, if Karpov got him to kill his own father, whom he loved so much, then they certainly were no better off.

“God it’s so scary,” Tony muttered, running a hand through his face, feeling tired from the previous conference. “To think there’s a guy who controls people just like that.”

It was hard to disagree with that.

“I think we should call Barnes,” Rhodey suggested. “We still haven’t heard the full story, we need to know and he can’t keep us in the dark forever.”

The rest of them agreed, but before he could say anything he got a call. Looking at the phone he realized it was Bucky.

“Guess we don’t need to call him anymore,” Steve muttered before answering. “Bucky?”

“Is rich boy there? I need to talk to him,” Bucky answered without saying anything else.

Steve sighed at the rudeness but eventually put Bucky on speaker, “Yeah he’s here, Tony.”

“Stark, I need you to look up some info, what’s the closest hospital if I someone gets hit by a bus around Michigan Avenue?”

Tony was stunned for a moment but shrugged and pulled out his phone, “Just a sec…okay the closest hospital is Metro General.”

“Great talk to you later.”

“Don’t-,” Steve called but the conversation had ended. “...Hang up.”

“Still think we shouldn’t tail him?” Natasha asked.

“We may not need to,” Aneka muttered looking at her phone. “I put a tracer on him.”

“Really?” Clint asked.

“Of course, I wasn’t going to let him help my prince if I didn’t know his movements.”

“When did you put a tracer on him?” Rhodey asked.

“Same time I put one on all of you,” Aneka shrugged, prompting them all to frown in confusion and look at their clothes. Wakandan tech, of course they couldn’t know about it.

“So I’m staying with my prince unless necessary, who wants to go?” Aneka continued.

“I vote Nat, she’s the best qualified,” Rhodey suggested.

“What about me?” Clint asked.

“Oh please, you stick out like a sore thumb,” Natasha said.

“If you’re talking about Budapest, it was one time!”

“Are you ever going to tell us what happened in Budapest?” Tony asked.

“No!” both assassins glared.

“I’ll go,” Steve announced, walking away from them. “He trusts me the most, Aneka send me the coordinates.”

None of them argued with Steve, it was better for him to do it because he had spent time with Bucky and therefore knew how to talk to him. It was okay for them, not so much for Natasha.

She caught up to him as he neared the elevator, “Steve!”

He turned back and was confused when she just shrugged expectantly.

“What?” he asked.

“Don’t you think you’re getting too close to Barnes?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I mean, you might not be as level-headed as you think, you like this guy, that’s obvious, but are you just using this as an excuse-.”

“I’m not using my friend’s traumatic predicament as an excuse to spend time with him if that’s what you think Nat!” Steve snapped surprising Natasha. When he saw her startled look he ran a hand through his hair, “Yeah I like him, but Bucky knows this Karpov guy because he was controlled by him as well, I just don’t want him to do this shit alone and I certainly don’t want any more of my friends to have to put their asses on the line as well.”

Natasha analyzed him for a moment before she took a deep breath, “You’re right, sorry.”

“It’s fine it’s just…maybe I am letting my feelings get the better of me, but seeing T’Challa in there, I can’t begin to imagine how scared Bucky must be, and yet he’s out there risking himself because he knows we can be controlled too. I don’t want him to be alone, if I can offer any support I will.”

Natasha sighed again, “Alright, just…call if you need anything.”

Steve nodded gratefully before he left as soon as the elevator doors opened. Natasha watched him leave feeling dread in her gut; she just hoped Steve wasn’t digging his own grave. They still didn’t know much about Barnes, and then there was also the mind controller.

The thought sent shivers through her and so she did what she always did in these situations, she called Fury.

“Fury here,” he answered.

“Hey Nick,” she greeted.

“Oh she calls! For a while there I almost thought you didn’t know how to operate a phone!”

She rolled her eyes in amusement, “Stop being so dramatic, it’s only been a week.”

“Too long for my tastes, what’s up? I assume you’re calling about T’Challa.”

“In a way…I need you to tell me about Barnes and this Karpov guy.”

Fury was silent on the other line, of course he knew something. He always knew something, so he definitely knew about this.

“Natasha, I'm not going to tell you anything you don’t need to know. All you need to know is that this Karpov is a bad dude and Barnes is your best chance at catching him.”

“Sounds fair,” she sighed.

Fury knew her secrets and he never spilled, it wasn’t fair for her to ask for someone else’s.

“Just keep an eye on T’Challa.”

“Will do.”

“And Nat, be careful.”

She smiled at his concern, “You too Nick.”

She ended the call and went back to sighing in exasperation; she did not like how things were going. Unfortunately there was nothing she could do but go and keep an eye on T’Challa like the rest. If she couldn’t do much at least she could be there for him and Aneka if they needed her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So...are you guys liking it?


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bucky is a annoyed with Steve's presence but at the same time he welcomes it. Everyone else begins to deal with the aftermath together, Sam is struggling with what he needs to do, while T'Challa is unsure if he deserves healing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for rape mention, slight racism, victims blaming themselves but not much else, and Steve knows when he's being a white idiot.

John Doe

Bucky couldn’t stop staring at that name; it wasn’t the John Doe he was looking for, rather the John Doe he desperately wanted to forget. 

He still remembered the blood from that night, coating his metal hand. He saw how the man emitted his last breaths before he was still, and Karpov, he just stood by the side as he made Bucky do it.

He shook his head and shoved the paper into his bag, unknowing what it would do to help him; maybe he just wanted to suffer with the memory, it was the least he deserved after all.

Redwing beeped at him in concern, making Bucky direct a small smile at him. For a robot he had a good way of expressing himself. In gratitude Bucky neared his hand to give the little guy the reaction he liked before ordering him to shut down so he could put him in his bag. Redwing had been useful in hacking the hospital records, but now the problem was that there was no other John Doe. There had been three people in that accident, two were accounted for while the other was still missing.

Another dead end, just fucking great.

Things got so much better when he found Steve waiting outside for him, Bucky sent him a glare to which Steve just shrugged. The guy made an attempt to seem polite when he waved but fuck if Bucky cared; he rolled his eyes and walked past him. He wasn't expecting the Avengers to listen but he wasn't going to pretend to be happy to see him.

“I thought I told you to stay put,” he nearly growled.

“Well, you didn’t actually think we would listen right?” Steve shrugged, walking after him.

“There’s nothing for you to do okay, so just go back to the tower.”

“And you’re going to fix this by yourself?”

“I’ll have better luck, you’re just a nuisance right now, just go back to the tower and play boy scout over there.”

“Listen," Steve began, trying not to sound more annoyed than he did. "I’ve been very patient and given you the benefit of the doubt, I even told my friends to stay with T’Challa, I think we deserve to be involved in your investigation. You can’t keep us in the dark.”

“What are you gonna do?”

Bucky would learn not to push Steve’s buttons after he grabbed him, dragged him into an empty alley then held him against a wall.

“I have a friend who was abducted, raped and lost his father thanks to some asshole; I don’t have the patience to deal with your bullshit.”

Bucky was annoyed by the action and though he wouldn’t say it, a little uncomfortable.

“Let go of me Rogers,” he hissed.

Steve glared at him but eventually released him, if only because Bucky asked.

“I get that you want to help him, but the best thing you can do is stay away from me.” Bucky explained. “Trust me this is a can of worms you don’t want to open.”

“I don’t care,” Steve stated. “He’s my friend and I’m not going to stop just because it’s dangerous.”

“…You’re gonna dig your grave with this, just look at what happened to him.”

“And I told you I don’t care, I want to help, we all do, and whatever you’re doing you can’t do it alone, you know that.”

Bucky hated to admit it, but Steve was right. That just pissed him off, “Ugh you really are a boy scout,” he muttered, rolling his eyes and began to walk away, uncaring if Steve followed him.

Steve almost scoffed at how childish Bucky was being but followed the man, because technically he didn’t say “no”. Steve wasn’t a fan of tailing people, but the guy had pushed him and if he didn’t let them help he would have to do so on his own.

“So what was in Metro Hospital?” Steve asked.

“Jack shit that’s what,” Bucky replied. “Just another dead end.”

“So what now?”

“Now I get myself some drinks until I figure out what I can do.”

Steve sighed, Bucky really needed to get a better hobby than drinking.

They made it to Bucky’s place, where Steve noticed the bar having a sign explaining that they would be closed for a while, “Where’s Sam?” he asked.

Bucky didn’t answer, he didn’t even acknowledge Steve’s question, just absentmindedly stared at the sign before walking toward the stairs; Steve got the hint.

“I still don’t know why you have to follow me, if I don’t have anything then there’s nothing you can do to help me."

"To be honest I want to keep you safe," Steve admitted once they began to go up the stairs.

Bucky stopped and turned to him in surprise, a small part of him feeling touched, but he would never voice this to Steve.

"I can actually handle myself, you know,” he muttered.

"So can I, but I never say no to back up, you can't always do things on your own, everyone needs help every now and then" Steve admitted.

Bucky kept a frown on him, "Fuck it's like you popped out of a self-improvement book."

Steve shrugged, "I'll take that as a compliment."

"Well then you heard it wrong."

Bucky resumed his pace as Steve gave him an amused huff, he had no idea what Steve was even going to do but there wasn’t much he could do against Captain America, even with his own strength.

They made their toward Bucky’s apartment, Steve was talking about how the place was a good vantage point while Bucky tried to ignore him. When Bucky neared the door he saw something wrong, there was someone inside. There was someone fiddling with something in there, and it sent warnings through Bucky’s head. He didn't hesitate to run toward the door, ignoring Steve's yell, he slammed it open immediately throwing the stranger against the wall. There was a cry of pain but Bucky didn’t care.

"Who sent you?!" he demanded, he saw the man groaning in pain and went to inspect the rest of his place.

"Buck-what the?!" Steve called but Bucky ignored him.

He checked everywhere for cameras, traps, _anything_.

__

"Who sent you?!" Bucky yelled again, grasping the man and slamming him against the wall.

“Hey, take it easy!” Steve yelled pulling Bucky off the man.

“Sam Wilson sent me!” the man yelled.

“What?” Bucky asked.

“Sam Wilson fucking sent me to fix the door!” the man repeated, “Fuck!”

“It’s okay, just put pressure on that,” Steve instructed, placing a cloth on the man’s bleeding shoulder. “Call an ambulance!” he snapped at Bucky.

“Shit!” Bucky hissed, taking his phone out and dialing.

A while later Bucky was looking down the window at Steve talking to the paramedics while doing something on his phone, the other guy was being loaded into the ambulance in the meantime.

He groaned and ran his hands over his face just as he heard his phone ring, he looked at it and saw that it was Sam, he frowned in anger before answering, “What the fuck were you thinking?!”

“I was thinking your door needed to be fixed,” Sam replied.

“God damn it, I could’ve killed him!” Bucky yelled. “Why the hell did you send him here?!”

“Well you gave me enough money to retire, I figured I could at least fix your door, I’m still your landlord, I even left you a message, how about checking your phone?”

“I fucking told you to stay the hell away! Now I have to deal with this shit as well!”

“Steve just texted me, he said Stark would have it covered.”

“Well that’s good, now all I need you to do is to stop calling or texting, or whatever, just stay away from me!”

“I was trying to make sure your door locked. How about a ‘thank you Sam for trying to fix my door’?”

“Hey back off! God you’re starting to sound like your pre-Riley ex!”

Bucky immediately regretted saying those words; there was a reason Sam never talked about that, and bringing it up was a low blow.

“… _Fuck_ you!”

Yep, he was an asshole.

“You know, I see a lot of strangers leave your apartment in an ambulance.”

Bucky nearly rolled his eyes at Thompson who had just arrived; great why not have a pigeon shit on him to make his day?

He ran a hand through his hair as he saw the ambulance begin to drive away when he caught something interesting; the ambulance number. He frowned at that, remembering something similar in the paper from the hospital, so he pulled the paper out, finding a number for the ambulance.

“You know, you’re pretty strong,” Thompson continued but Bucky ignored him and ran down to meet Steve.

“Hey, Stark’s taking care of it,” Steve explained, which Bucky ignored.

“We’re going on a field trip,” Bucky stated.

“What? Where?” Steve asked but Bucky ignored that as well.

Rather than explain Bucky walked toward the subway station, activating Redwing and making him give him the information he needed. Steve watched with uncertainty while this happened, annoyed but didn’t say anything. It irked him that Bucky didn’t share information but at the same time it amused him, not to mention he found it oddly interesting seeing the man work. He waited a few minutes before Bucky got what he needed.

“Got it!” Bucky said in triumph.

“You gonna explain anytime?” Steve asked.

“There was a bus crash where I thought Karpov died, there were three victims, the bus driver and two John Does.”

“One of them being Karpov?”

“Yes, but the hospital only knows about one, so now Redwing here,” the robot beeped at his mention. “...just informed me that there were two ambulances dispatched there, one was stolen by the driver.”

“So we’re going to see the driver who took it because he might know something,” Steve concluded.

“Well look at you,” Bucky smirked just as the train arrived and he went to get in. “You’re not a bad detective.”

Steve frowned in amusement at that, “Was that a compliment?”

Bucky rolled his eyes as he instructed Redwing to shut down, going into the train while Steve followed.

Once inside the train Bucky’s nerves began to set in, he was going to meet the guy who might know something about Karpov, who may still know him.

“What if this is another trap?” Steve asked. “What if he wants us there?”

Bucky gulped quietly, “Either way we have no choice.”

That didn’t ease his nerves; it just agitated him even more. Getting one step closer to Karpov was good but it still sent shivers down his spine, because the thought of getting closer to the man terrified him. His hands clenched on the fabric of his pants as his tried to calm his breathing. What if he was waiting for him there? What if he got a hold of him again? No, he couldn’t think of this now? He shouldn’t let it get to him, not now, not in front of Steve. Shit, he could hear his voice, of the time of the crash. It was an echo in his mind, one that grew louder and louder, almost like he was right behind him.

_“Come back here!”_

“Buck!” Steve called, placing a hand on Bucky’s, making him jump and snapping him out of his thoughts.

Bucky looked to Steve in surprise as he tried to keep his breathing in check, his eyes kept blinking as they tried to adjust to his surroundings, his hands finally eased on the fabric of his jeans as Steve kept a firm grip on his hand.

“You okay?” Steve asked softly, watching as Bucky drew uneven breaths.

“Yeah,” Bucky gulped, still breathing harshly but he was starting to even it out. 

He wouldn’t admit it but he was glad Steve had been there otherwise he might’ve caused a scene. Right now, the hand on his kept him grounded, it made him remember that he wasn’t there anymore, he was in the train with Steve. 

“I’m sorry,” he muttered, once he calmed down.

“It’s okay, you don’t have to apologize for not feeling well,” Steve replied, gently rubbing the top of Bucky’s hand.

The touch felt calming and soothing, and Bucky welcomed it, a nice comfort when he started to sing as quietly as he could.

" _Shlof shoyn mayn tayer faygele_  
_Makh shoyn tsu dayn kosher aygelekh_  
_Shlof shoyn shlof_  
_In ziser ruh_  
_Aaaaai lu lu lu lu lu lu"_

Steve didn’t question why Bucky was singing or what language it was, he just continued to rub the hand with his thumb. Right now he was just glad to provide this small support for Bucky, he couldn’t begin to imagine how afraid the other man felt at the moment. He would just have to be there in case he was needed.

~~~~~

Aneka was by far worried, her prince was suffering and there was nothing she could do about it. Whenever she tried to talk to him he wouldn’t say anything, he wouldn’t acknowledge her presence. He just sat there without moving, only when being coaxed by Vision to eat or go to the bathroom. Even she, one of his closest friends, was unable to get through to him, he was so broken.

“You should rest,” Rhodey said, patting her on the shoulder.

“I can’t leave him,” Aneka muttered.

“He won’t be alone, I’ll look after him.”

She sighed through her nose before replying, “I shouldn’t.”

“Aneka, you can’t stay here forever,” Rhodey coaxed. “You’re not going to be of much help if you pass out from exhaustion.”

“He’s right,” Natasha called going toward them. “Come on, you need some girl-bonding time to relax.”

“But-.”

“Relax woman,” Clint called through the com system. “Vision and I got the perimeter, you can take turns watching him, but you need to take a break.”

Aneka was reluctant but eventually allowed herself to be guided away by Natasha when she heard that, to be honest she did crave something to ease her mind. As much as she hated to admit it, they were right.

“So what did you have in mind for girl-bonding time?” Aneka asked as she followed Natasha to the training room.

“I figured a level twelve training session,” Natasha shrugged taking off her jacket and picking up her nearby batons. “Then, I don’t know…do each other’s hair?”

“I have no hair.”

“Right, then I do your nails.”

Aneka smiled in gratitude as she went to pick up a sword. As much as she hated to admit, she welcomed Natasha’s efforts to make her relax.

“You’re not so bad Romanoff, for a white person,” Aneka said in amusement.

Natasha smiled cheerfully, “Yay!”

She immediately started the training sequence.

A hologram appeared behind Aneka who swiftly turned and slashed at it, then slashed another that appeared next to her. Natasha did the same with some holograms. After the two got back to back with each other as more started appearing.

“I like this,” Aneka said in amusement. “It brings back memories of when I was twelve and facing an equal number of opponents.”

“Show off,” Natasha said rolling her eyes with a smile.

The women laughed for a bit before they got to fighting again, with graceful yet deadly movements.

~~~~~

After the women had left Tony entered the area, two cups of coffee in hand, and went over to Rhodey.

“Boy this is a mess,” Tony muttered as he sipped from one cup and handed the other to Rhodey who gladly took it.

“I’ll say,” Rhodey muttered feeling great comfort when Tony rested his head on his shoulder. “The worst part is there wasn’t anything we could do. I mean look at us, we get called Earth’s Mightiest Heroes and we couldn’t even help our friends, one of them is dead, the other two being hunted, one of which is basically a walking corpse.”

“I hear you,” Tony muttered, thinking about the whole thing, and how much it unnerved him. “…Does it scare you?”

“What happened? Hell yeah, some asshole who controls minds forcing you to do something you don’t want. It terrifies the living hell out of me. Why do you ask?”

“I can’t help but think that if T’Challa wasn’t safe, how are we? …How are you?”

Rhodey smiled sadly, taking Tony’s hand in reassurance, “I guess we just have to work past that, we need to help him.”

“Yeah, we do,” Tony nodded, firmly grasping Rhodey’s hand.

His tensions weren’t eased though, they never were because…well because he was Tony. He just worried, about Rhodey specifically. He worried about him more than anything.

He cleared his throat, trying to find the right words to say, “…Rhodey I’m gonna ask you a favor, whatever happens, if this guy gets to me…just do what you have to do.”

“Tony-.”

“I can’t…watch you get hurt because of me so just, promise okay.”

“Tony I-.”

“Please.”

Rhodey gave a long sigh at that, if Tony ever said please it was because he was truly desperate. 

“Promise,” Rhodey muttered.

“Thank you.”

“So can I ask of you the same thing?”

“Nope, I called it first.”

“Hey not fair!”

“Is too, I called dibs.”

“I hate you.”

The two laughed a little, welcoming the small distraction. They knew their problems were just beginning but for now they just needed this moment, they would get through this. They intertwined their fingers, leaning into each other as they resolved to help their friend together.

~~~~~

After displaying movements worthy of the leader of the Dora Milaje and the Black Widow both women had taken showers and were now in Aneka’s bedroom. Aneka sat behind Natasha, fixing the red hair while her legs extended at Natasha’s sides letting her paint her toe nails; Aneka was working on a waterfall braid while Natasha focused on making lovely flower designs over blue nail polish.

“I have to admit this is fun,” Aneka acknowledged.

“Glad you’re feeling okay,” Natasha laughed.

“…I don’t know about okay,” Aneka admitted. “I _am_ feeling slightly better.”

Natasha said nothing afterwards she just finished up her designs and waited for Aneka to finish her hair so she could do her hand nails. After a while she noticed a small falter in Aneka’s ministrations; that made Natasha’s gut clench. It just wasn’t fair on Aneka or T’Challa; it was childish to think like that but still.

“Hey,” Natasha spoke. “I just want you to know that you’re not alone in this.”

“…I should’ve been in that elevator with them,” Aneka whispered as she finished with Natasha’s hair, letting the other woman turn around to work on the nails.

“You did what you were told,” Natasha explained as she painted the nails, more to distract them both than to finish them. “You can’t go and blame yourself for this, blame the asshole who did this to him, focus your rage on him so when the time is right you’ll feel satisfied when you can beat the shit out of him.”

Aneka gave a small laugh.

“It’s hard for me to stop feeling guilty,” Aneka replied, watching Natasha work on her nails. “Ever since I was a child all I wanted to do was join the Dora Milaje, I wanted to protect my country and the royal family, so I trained hard. I just wanted them to choose me; I wanted them to see that I would do anything to protect them. When King T’Chaka chose me, _me_ out of all the girls in my tribe, I felt so much joy. When he chose me as the leader, it was like all my dreams had come true. I was so determined not to fail him, I helped T’Challa and Shuri train, and I got to spend time with the queen, I was so happy…When T’Challa disappeared I felt so angry at myself, and when my king died a part of me died with him.”

Natasha, having finished the bottom coat, reached over and put a hand on the woman’s shoulder, letting her know that she was there, she wasn’t going anywhere, and she could trust her with her vulnerability. 

Aneka welcomed the touch; it was nice to be able to let her walls down with a friend who wouldn’t judge her. She truly felt glad to have Natasha with her, knowing she would understand her feelings of regret.

“Ayo often told me that I was the greatest warrior she had ever seen,” she continued. “But I can’t imagine her saying that after this.”

“She would, she still would,” Natasha assured.

“…A part of me stayed because I wish to help my Prince, a selfish part of me stayed because I couldn’t bear to face her, or the Queen and Princess.”

“We’ll clear T’Challa’s name,” Natasha said, determination in her voice. “I don’t know how, but we’ll make sure you both get to go home. I promise.”

Aneka said nothing, neither did Natasha for a while. They both just sat in each other’s company. Though the two came from different backgrounds they had a mutual understanding. For that Natasha would offer Aneka the support she would need right now, the woman deserved it.

“So what should we do?” Natasha asked, offering a distraction. “It might take a while for the nails to dry.”

They heard a knock on the door, followed by Clint opening it, “Pardon me ladies, but Vison offered to keep watch all night and I heard you were having girl-bonding time.”

The women laughed at his excited face, Natasha becoming him over. He skipped over to them and let Natasha do his nails while Aneka’s dried.

“Put them in water, they’ll dry faster,” Clint suggested.

“You just want me to do your hair,” Aneka rolled her eyes.

“Well if you can do anything to this bird’s nest,” Clint shrugged.

Natasha started doing his nails as they began to talk animatedly, Aneka feeling more than glad for the support. It was odd to have someone take care of her; she was usually the one taking care of everyone else, considering she was the strongest Dora Milaje. She felt odd to let her walls down, and almost unworthy, but these two allowed her to see that it was okay, that she didn’t have to face this alone. Well, once in a while didn’t hurt, especially because there were difficult times ahead.

“Come here!” Clint said, wrapping his arms around Aneka while still stretching them for Natasha to paint.

“What are you doing?” Aneka glared, though she felt more amused than angry.

“Cuddling,” Clint answered with a shrug. “Cuddling makes everything better.”

The women rolled their eyes but let the man be, Aneka couldn’t say she minded the contact, cuddling _did_ feel nice, even if it was with a white boy.

~~~~~

Sam felt like shit, and all thanks to Bucky. If he ever saw him again, he’d punch the guy for his last comment. What right did he have to remind him of Brock?

He groaned, running a hand through his hair, his nerves itching for a fucking drink. It had been such a long time for him going without a drink and now he was going to ruin it. He hadn’t had the urge to have a drink in such a long time, it was the only reason he opened up a bar, because he knew he could do it. At least he thought he could, but now his resolve was breaking. Why? Because he couldn't handle being alone with the memories of his mistakes. 

It was just one drink he needed, no more. No, he couldn’t, he swore he wouldn’t. Damn it, why the hell did Bucky have to be such an ass? Now he was here, desperate for something to ease his mind, maybe just a can of beer, one never hurt anyone. 

Yeah, maybe just one.

With that in mind he went outside toward the liquor store, feeling too lazy and desperate to walk toward his own bar. Once in front of it, he hesitated. It looked so damn tempting but he just couldn’t. He was doing so good, he was better, so much better that he was able to open up a bar and not feel the temptation to drink. Now he was here, back to the way he had been.

He couldn’t, but damn it he really wanted one. It wasn’t his fault if he took one right? Bucky was usually what kept him sane nowadays, but the guy was gone so who cared right? Just one.

Just one to get him in the mood for many.

Shit, he remembered those words all too well.

_“Alright enough of that!”_

_His drink was yanked out of his hand._

_“Come on man!” Sam begged pathetically. “I just need one, that’s all.”_

_“Yeah, one to get you in the mood for many!”_

_Sam had no argument there, he looked at the drink with longing. Damn it, he wanted it so badly!_

_“I’m sorry,” he sobbed. “I just, I just…”_

_“Hey, hey, look at me babe.”_

_He blinked through his tears, looking up at those beautiful blue eyes, that smiling face, **Riley’s** face._

_“Listen, you can do this,” Riley said. “I’m not always going to be there to stop you; so you need to be strong.”_

_“I can’t, I fucking can’t!” Sam cried._

_“Yes, you can! You know why? Because you’re the most badass person I’ve ever met.”_

_Sam laughed, feeling his cheeks heat up._

_“You can definitely do this baby; I **know** you’re strong enough to do this.”_

_“What if I can’t?”_

_Riley smiled, caressing Sam’s cheek, then faking a pout, “Then how the hell am I gonna get my bar?”_

Sam remembered how much Riley wanted a bar, mostly because he enjoyed making the drinks. He also remembered how he wasn’t willing to do it unless Sam was no longer an alcoholic, he was patient with that, helped Sam and took him to therapy sessions. Riley wanted that bar so much, but he wanted Sam to be okay more. 

How the hell had Riley put up with him?

He nearly growled as he stepped away from the store, fuck he really needed to do something to get his mind off of alcohol. What the hell had he been doing to keep him from alcohol for the past…how many days? Great, he lost count now.

Well the for the last whatever days, he often talked to Bucky whenever the guy allowed him to, it was only until recently that he really started hanging out with him again. He also sent him cases; that was always interesting, especially the outcome. He wondered what Bucky was doing; maybe he was off on his solo investigation. No, he remembered Steve calling from Bucky’s apartment; the guy was helping Bucky now. Great now he had someone else to help him, he didn’t need Sam anymore.

He needed to think of better things because this would cause him to go back to the liquor store. He took deep breaths as he walked, not going to his apartment, he needed some air.

Just as he walked he looked toward a TV in a store, the news was on again, about how T’Challa had murdered his father. As always they had nothing good to say. Of course, murderer and black, who would want to say something good right? None of them brought up the good things T’Challa had done, or how he loved his father, like they did with white criminals, hell the only reason they weren't going for the mugshot was because T'Challa had no personal photos available to the public. No one was giving him the benefit of the doubt. He and Sam were alike in that aspect; a while back no one had anything good to say about Sam either...well, no one but Riley. 

_“Why’d you help me?” Sam once asked, as he sat cuddled next to Riley._

_Riley smiled, resting his cheek on Sam’s head, and replied, “Because I saw a bird with its wings broken, and I thought: with a little care, those wings can definitely heal, and then he could fly in the skies as he was supposed to. And fly you have my sweet Falcon.”_

_Sam chuckled, “Only if I fly with my sweet Canary.”_

Sam took a deep breath, blinking back the tears that threatened to fall from his eyes. He couldn’t just sit around and do nothing, Riley wouldn’t have, so to hell with what Bucky said.

With that in mind he headed toward Avengers Tower, not sure what he would do, but willing to do what he could. He may have lost his Canary, but he wasn’t going to just watch this time.

~~~~~

Steve and Bucky arrived at their destination by midnight and sought shelter in a cheap motel, there was just one problem.

“We could flip for it,” Steve suggested as he eyed the _only_ bed in the _only_ available room.

“You do that,” Bucky muttered going to lie on the floor.

“Seriously?” Steve asked.

“It’s good for the back,” Bucky mumbled, letting the floor align his column. “I slept in worse places when I was in the army, this is nothing.”

Steve shrugged, he just didn’t want Bucky to be uncomfortable but if the guy was okay who was he to say otherwise.

“So you were in the army?”

“Boundaries, Rogers, boundaries,” Bucky groaned as he rubbed at his shoulder, feeling the lack of maintenance catching up to him. “Shit.”

“You okay?” Steve asked as Bucky sat up and looked to be in pain.

“Yeah, just my fucking arm, I haven’t given it any maintenance, mind if I do that.”

“It’s your arm, don’t mind me,” Steve shrugged going to sit on an armchair. 

Bucky said nothing and dug around his bag for his tools.

“Need some help?” Steve asked.

Bucky groaned, “Well if you could help with taking my jacket off.”

Steve was a little thrown off by the request but he shook his head; he was pretty sure Bucky didn’t mean it like that. After clearing that out in his head, he went to help the guy ease out of the jacket. He had to help with Bucky’s shirt as well, until he was left with only a tank top. Now Steve was able to get a good look at his arm, the area around the stump was severely scarred, and Bucky hadn’t been kidding when he said his arm was made of metal, it was full of metallic plates that made the arm move just like a real one. It was an amazing piece of technology which no doubt Tony would want to get his hands on.

He watched closely as Bucky worked on the arm, tweaking around with a few things that Steve had no clue about. He felt curious as to how it worked but his gazed was noted, and not appreciated.

“Could you please not look?” Bucky glared.

“Sorry,” Steve muttered, instantly looking away. “I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable.”

“Then you shouldn’t stare,” Bucky muttered, resuming his work.

“Sorry,” Steve repeated. “I was just curious to see how it worked…you don't need to be ashamed of it.”

“I’m not…” Bucky snapped, before his voice lowered in embarrassment. “I just don’t like it when people stare.”

“I get it, you don’t have to explain.”

“Can you just talk about something else?”

“…What language was that song you were singing in the train?”

Bucky smiled at the question, a foreign feeling of pride settled within him. He liked his boundaries, but when it came to that he didn’t mind letting Steve cross them. He may have lost a lot of things but not his pride over his heritage.

“Yiddish,” he replied. “I’m Jewish on my mother’s side, my family spoke it more than Hebrew. Don’t speak much now, and I’ve forgotten a lot of things but I know that song completely.”

“Wait, you’re Jewish?” Steve asked, looking surprised, then immediately regretted asking.

“Why, you think I don’t look the part?” Bucky asked. He wasn’t angry, just amused that the ultimate boy-scout would say something anti-Semitic. 

“What?!” Steve yelped. “No! That’s not what I-!”

He realized it was too late when Bucky raised an eyebrow.

“Okay maybe and I’m sorry,” Steve answered sheepishly, “I’m a white asshole.”

Bucky chuckled at that, “Eh, you’re a white idiot not an asshole, can’t really hold it against you, you pay visits to cancer patients and homeless shelters.”

Steve laughed sheepishly again, feeling embarrassed.

“I won’t do it again,” he muttered, looking genuinely sorry.

It made Bucky smile, Steve was definitely an idiot, not an asshole.

“So anyways,” Steve said clearing his throat. “If you don’t mind, why were you singing it?”

Bucky having finished with his arm started putting his clothes back on as he replied, “It’s an old lullaby my mom used to sing to me, when I went to therapy the guy said singing a verse of a song I liked helped with the panic attacks, so I chose that.”

“So you get panic attacks often?” Steve asked.

Bucky was close to telling him to fuck off, but he realized Steve wasn’t prying, he was genuinely curious, he also looked a bit hopeful, “Every now and then,” Bucky muttered.

“Yeah I know what that’s like,” Steve sighed.

“You do?”

Now he could see that Steve looked relieved, his shoulders relaxed and he cracked a small smile; so he wanted to know if Bucky understood the feeling.

“I sometimes wake up and remember the old days,” Steve answered. “When there were people dying, a lot of them I could’ve saved but for some reason didn’t.”

Bucky said nothing, he only looked at Steve with sympathy, he understood all too well the feeling. When he was fighting in the war, he would feel incredible guilt at seeing how his comrades kept dying around him. He would often think about how maybe he wasn’t fast enough to save them, or maybe he didn’t have eyes everywhere like he was supposed to.

“I sometimes wake up, feeling like I could’ve done more,” Steve continued.

Bucky smiled in sympathy taking a beer from a pack he bought earlier, “Don’t feel too bad, you punched Hitler in the face.”

Steve chuckled, “Oh I wish, I bet if I had, it would help me sleep better at nights.”

“You should drink,” Bucky said, taking a drink himself. “Drinking helps you sleep.”

“You really need to stop drinking so much,” Steve said going to lie on the bed. “Besides I can’t get drunk.”

“You’re shitting!”

“Nope, I really can’t get drunk, I can’t even get a little tipsy.”

“Shit, even I can get drunk, if I drink enough that is.”

“Well you shouldn’t, come on, get some sleep,” Steve chuckled lying back on the pillows.

Bucky didn’t sleep, but he didn’t feel like telling Steve that, or that alcohol was the only thing that helped with that. Right now though, he didn’t have enough beer to help him. For that and only that, he was glad to have Steve for company.

“So why did you want to follow me?” Bucky asked.

“I figured you needed help.”

“Yeah, but you could’ve sent anyone, why you?”

“You seem to trust me the most.”

“I guess, it’s because you’re too honest for your own good.”

Steve chuckled, “Yeah I get that a lot.”

“So why really?”

“…I guess I just needed to do something, I hate seeing my friend the way he is, and I’m not able to do anything to make it better, except help you out.”

Bucky finished his beer and popped another one before he spoke, “Don’t blame yourself for anything.”

“I don’t,” Steve replied. “And I want you to know I don’t blame you either.”

Bucky said nothing further, preferring to drink the rest of the beers in silence. He definitely didn’t agree with Steve, it was his fault after all, he was the one who didn’t make sure Karpov was dead.

It was his fault.

~~~~~

“Can you believe the news?” Tony scoffed in disgust. “They’re cutting out the pieces where he’s seen crying and holding his father’s corpse, they’re just showing the part where he’s still firing the gun.”

“God forbid a black man show remorse for a crime,” Rhodey muttered while rolling his eyes. “But sure, white dude shoots a bunch of black people, he was troubled.”

“…Wait,” Tony said looking at the comments from where he found the footage. “We could use this.”

“How?”

“Look there are already theories on Tumblr about how maybe he was influenced or something.”

“You have a Tumblr?”

“Yes I like shitposting; anyways this means that we can sow the benefit of the doubt if we can just get a news station to publish these videos.”

“That’s not a bad idea you know,” Rhodey acknowledged. “The question is who would do that.”

“Christine.”

“You really think she’ll do that?”

“We’ll just have to find out.”

“Perhaps tomorrow.”

Both men jumped when they heard Vision speak, suddenly showing up beside them.

“How many times have I told you not to do that?” Rhodey hissed.

“Forgive me, but it seems we have a guest.”

Rhodey and Tony frowned at each other before following Vision who beckoned them to the main room.

~~~~~

Sam had no idea what he was doing here. After he showed up the others greeted him, Aneka treated him with caution but remembered him from his time helping the prince. Now they were all looking through the glass where the prince sat in the same way he had been all day, according to them.

With a little coaxing, he managed to let Aneka and the Avengers to let him talk to T’Challa. 

“What will you say?” Aneka asked.

To be honest, he had no idea what he was going to say, but what he learned at the VA meetings was that he had to step in there first. 

“Don’t know,” he admitted.

He gave them all a short nod before taking a deep breath and stepping into the room. Once inside he felt completely lost. T’Challa didn’t even react to his presence; he seemed to be uncaring of the world around him.

Sam wanted to say so many things, stuff to make him feel better, maybe tell him more jokes so that he could laugh, but he knew this wasn’t easy. Recovery was never easy, or quick, he knew that all too well. T’Challa needed help in his recovery, but he had to want it first. It was at least in this that Sam could help, maybe he wasn’t a super soldier or a detective like Bucky, but he could still help someone the way Riley helped him.

“I know it doesn’t look that way, but you can get better,” Sam spoke softly as he went to sit at the edge of the bed. “…I’m not gonna lie, it’s gonna be tough, and who knows, maybe you won’t get far…but I assure you, you’re gonna get better.”

T’Challa was silent, staring off somewhere in a different space. 

“I know how much it hurts,” Sam muttered.

“…You know what it’s like killing your father?”

Sam felt surprised but it quickly passed, he only smiled bitterly and replied, “No, but I know what it’s like to watch.”

This time it was T’Challa’s turn to look surprised, he finally turned his gaze toward Sam as the other explained, “I imagine you were somewhat aware of what was happening, I know what it’s like, feeling like an unwilling passenger, forced to watch as those you care about die. It happened once with my parents, and then again when I lost my boyfriend.”

Neither were aware of it, but T’Challa was paying close attention.

“You think you should’ve done something, anything, but you didn’t, you couldn’t…and even when everyone tells you it wasn’t your fault, you can’t stop thinking it is.”

“…He made me give my father updates,” T’Challa finally muttered, Sam didn’t bother asking. “I wanted to tell him what was happening, but I couldn’t…the words I wanted to say were like a small echo, everything he told me felt like an incredible _need_ , he told me to do something and that was all I could think about…and I never got to say goodbye.”

“And you were aware of it all,” Sam muttered, not a question. 

“Not at first, but then I started to realize what was happening, I tried to fight him but…I wasn’t strong enough.”

“That doesn’t mean it was your fault,” Sam reassured. “It was _his_ fault. This is on him…Your father loved you, and I know you loved him, you still do. He wouldn’t have blamed you.”

T’Challa couldn’t take it anymore, he started crying. He felt like a child once more, he just wanted his father; he wanted to be held by him and told that it would all be okay, that it was just a bad dream. 

“Listen to me T’Challa,” Sam urged. “Whatever you can do to help, you need to. If you stop fighting, he wins. Don’t let him do that, don’t let him take you from the rest of your family.”

“They think I killed him.”

“No, they don’t. They know the truth, but no one else does. If we can’t convince everyone that you didn’t do this, you won’t see them again…I know you’re tired, but you have to keep going. For your mother and sister, do it for them.”

“…What can I even do?”

Sam took a deep breath, “For starters you need to tell us what you know, and after that you need to focus on your recovery. It won’t be easy, but you have people who want to help you.” 

T’Challa was silent for a moment, not sure how to react or what to say. There was no changing what happened for him, it was still his hands that killed his father. He wasn’t strong enough, and now he wouldn’t get to see his family ever again, perhaps he shouldn’t bother trying to recover, he didn’t deserve it right?

However one look at Sam shook that resolve. Here was a man, almost a stranger, telling him he was worth saving, that there were people ready to help him. He wanted him to be okay, his mother and sister wanted him to be okay. Despite everything they wanted to help him.

He felt the straps on his wrists being undone; he absentmindedly rubbed at them, though they hadn’t hurt him. 

Sam smiled in reassurance when he saw T’Challa’s hesitation, then he turned to the window and beckoned whoever wanted to come over.

The door opened after a few minutes and in came Aneka, followed by Natasha, then Rhodey, Clint and Tony struggled a moment when they entered at the same time.

“We’re here for you,” Aneka stated. “We’re not going anywhere.”

T’Challa smiled; feeling like all his burdens had lifted even if it was only a little. He knew nothing could erase what happened, or make him forget, but he could at least try to move on. Sam was right, it wouldn’t be easy but he needed to at least start, for Aneka, for his friends, for his mother and sister. 

He looked to Sam, the man had offered him the push he needed, seeing his encouraging face made him stand and go to Aneka, embracing her. He buried his face on her shoulder, taking in her warmth and comfort. 

“You’re father once said: misfortune shouldn’t drive you back, it should make you fight.”

T’Challa knew those words all too well, that’s why he knew he had to fight. He looked to the rest of his friends, sensing their support, and smiling in gratitude. He wasn’t going to let this drive him back, he wasn’t going to give Karpov the satisfaction of breaking him.

Sam stood by the side, feeling a sense of relief at how this man could now begin to heal. Immediately he was reminded of Riley, how the man helped him to his feet. Now it was Sam’s turn to help someone else.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really wanted to dwelve into what everyone else was going through, especially with Sam. 
> 
> I wanted to do this for fanfic writer's appreciation day but I got sidetracked, anyways, I want you guys to know that I love you all for supporting this fic. Let me know what you think, I love hearing you guys!


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bucky and Steve continue investigating while T'Challa begins his healing process as well as bonding with Sam.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hate life, it kept me from updating, but hey it's finally here right?
> 
> Warnings for flashbacks of non-consensual touching, rape mention and characters going through depression.

Bucky hadn’t been able to sleep all night so when morning came he tiredly stood up, grabbed a pillow, and tossed it to Steve. He huffed in amusement when the blond woke up with a jolt, looking almost ready to fight. 

“Wha-?” Steve muttered.

“Get the hell up,” Bucky muttered, rubbing his face and hoping the circles under his eyes weren’t that noticeable.

Steve groaned before yawning, “Was there any need for that?”

“Yep,” Bucky said going toward the bathroom to splash some cold water in his face.

“Crap, did you sleep at all last night?” Steve asked as he went in after him, apparently his bags _were_ noticeable.

“Maybe,” Bucky muttered. “I’ll just get some coffee and I’ll be fine.”

“Are you sure? You look way too tired.”

Bucky sighed, hoping Steve wouldn’t pester too much. He was about to tell him to stop but then he eyed Steve’s reflection as he stood behind him.

 _“Look at you, my darling,” Karpov whispered as Bucky watched him lean into him from the mirror. “So exquisite.”_

He quickly splashed more water on his face, taking deep breaths. He still felt the man’s touch from all those times he stood behind Bucky like that; he remembered how he liked to fuck him while forcing Bucky to watch his own reflection. 

His body felt numb despite the shaking; he needed the image out of his head.

Steve’s brow furrowed at how Bucky kept splashing water on his face, the action seeming desperate. 

“You okay?” he asked eyeing Bucky’s trembling hands. 

“…Yeah,” Bucky replied tightly before leaving the bathroom and then the motel room. 

Steve stared after him, unsure if he should go after him or not. He slowly exited the bathroom and found the empty beer bottles on the floor where Bucky had been. He regarded the facts in concern; apparently Bucky couldn’t sleep if he didn’t have enough alcohol in his system. Not good, not good at all.

~~~~~

Steve didn’t mention anything to Bucky, and for that Bucky felt glad, he had enough crap to deal with and his stupid PTSD didn’t help. Then again, when does PTSD help?

“Who are we looking for?” Steve asked, in order to distract Bucky from the ordeal.

Bucky welcomed the distraction and scanned his phone before showing him the information, “Jack Denton, you can see all his information and what happened.”

“No work comp,” Steve muttered. “All because someone made him to steal an ambulance.”

“Well, if all goes well then maybe you can help out.”

Steve wasn’t going to deny that, if he could help someone who got fired thanks to Karpov then he would.

They made their way to the address without another word. Once they arrived, they found a woman shoveling snow from her driveway. 

“Excuse me,” Steve called, catching the woman’s attention. “We’re looking for Jack Denton. Is he home?”

The woman eyed them cautiously, “What do you want with him?”

“Just to talk,” Bucky said. “I’m an investigator looking into an accident, a bus crash, two ambulances were dispatched, Jack was the driver of one of them.” 

“…My Jackie’s got nothing to say to you people,” the woman said while continuing to shovel snow. “Turning your backs on him.”

Bucky and Steve met each other’s eyes before Bucky spoke again, turning to scrutinizing the woman, “I know Jack drove one of the ambulances to the scene and from there he just drove off. Never explained why.”

The woman sighed, looking at him with a tired smile, “You know a lot, don’t you?”

“It’s my job,” Bucky shrugged, tapping Steve in the shoulder as the woman continued to shovel snow. He cocked his head toward the woman.

Steve considered the gesture for a moment before he sighed, of course Bucky would take advantage of his fame, sneaky bastard.

“Ma’am,” Steve called, taking his cap off and watching the woman stare in surprise. “My name is Steve Rogers, you might know me as Captain America.”

Bucky tried to hold back a smile. Now that he heard it from Steve, the name sounded funny.

“I know that Jack was denied worker’s comp, because he stole the ambulance,” Steve continued, trying to ignore the twitch around Bucky’s mouth.

“They got it back,” the woman argued.

“I know ma’am, but if we can understand what happened, I may be able to pull some strings and reverse the ruling.”

The woman’s eyes darted between both men, settling on Steve with a smile, “He always was a fan of you.” Steve breathed an embarrassed laugh before the woman stuck the shovel on the ground, “Maybe God, sent you, maybe he didn’t.”

She then shuffled through the snow toward her porch, beckoning them over.

“Nice,” Bucky whispered to Steve with a smirk, while Steve rolled his eyes in amusement. It was not nice to take advantage of his fame.

They stepped into the house after the woman, only for Bucky to wish he hadn’t. His eyes widened in shock and, frankly, disgust. Crosses, pictures and statues of Jesus and Mary, _white_ Jesus and Mary to be specific, riddled the place. 

“Ugh,” he whispered to Steve. “This is it, this is Jewish hell.”

Steve smacked his elbow in scolding, making Bucky smirk.

“She’s old, leave her alone,” Steve hissed watching Bucky roll his eyes, but trying to hide his own smile.

“This way,” the woman called back.

Bucky swore if T’Challa didn’t need his help he’d be out of the woman’s place in a heartbeat, but since that wasn’t the case he had to walk through halls decorated with those things. He kept holding back his groans as the woman led them toward her son, but when they reached the man Bucky almost wanted to keep looking at the crosses instead of the man before him. 

“What the,” Steve muttered. 

Bucky couldn’t have said it better. 

The man was hooked to a machine, a hemodialysis one at that. From the looks of it, he was almost unable to move, he could barely turn his head toward them when they approached. 

“This wasn’t in his file,” Bucky stated, as he regarded Jack’s appearance, seeing how Jack’s eyes went from Steve’s and then settled on his. The man knew who Bucky was.

“He had a stroke,” the woman explained.

“He’s too young for a stroke,” Steve commented. 

“They think his body went into shock after the surgery,” the woman continued. “When he donated his kidneys.”

Both men hoped their shock wasn’t too evident, Bucky in particular felt a cold grip in his gut, “Kidneys _plural_?”

“So selfless of him and brave,” the woman said, helping Jack sip his drink. “After the shenanigans with the ambulance, Jackie disappeared for three weeks, then I get a call from the hospital, they found him in an alley, half-dead because of his sacrifice." 

A sacrifice, but certainly not a willing one. 

"The Lord is an incredible maker of lives, for years I prayed he’d send Jack back home, I’d lost my son when he was on liquor all the time so I prayed for his return, and here he is. My prayers were answered, not like I had expected, you can never see God coming.”

Steve smiled awkwardly in agreement, but Bucky couldn’t bring himself to do that, he couldn’t keep his eyes off the man, and he couldn’t stop thinking about how his body was now in this state because of Karpov…because of him.

“Pray with us,” the woman offered, snapping Bucky out of his daze.

“Oh no, I’m just getting off a cold,” Bucky lied.

Steve was a little more hesitant to refuse, but he too said, “Same here.”

“Huh, I had no idea you were capable of getting sick,” the woman commented.

“I’m still human,” Steve laughed awkwardly. Truthfully his immune system kept him from getting sick, but seeing Jack in his state made him unable to pray along with the woman.

Bucky kept looking at Jack before his eyes darted toward the machine. He faked a cough, meeting Steve’s eyes.

“Speaking of which, do you have anything for cough, if it’s not too much trouble?” Steve asked, taking the hint.

“Oh allow me to make some tea,” the woman said.

“I’ll go help,” Steve offered.

“Oh that’s so nice of you, you _are_ the gentleman everyone says you are,” the woman chuckled as she led Steve to the kitchen. “Say, would it be alright if you signed his trading cards?”

“Of course ma’am,” Steve smiled before looking back and nodding to Bucky. 

Once they were alone Bucky went toward the machine, it seemed expensive, far too expensive for a woman who lived on retirement funds. He met Jack’s eyes one more time before he started inspecting the machine and taking pictures, Jack’s eyes remained on him the whole time.

Having finished with the pictures he stood up, looking straight into the man’s eyes. A man who had been torn apart and left for dead, another broken person left by Karpov. 

“…God didn’t do this, the Devil did,” he said without regret, even toward his heritage. “And I’m gonna find him.”

Suddenly Jack started twitching and breathing heavily, his hand moving toward a pen near him, Bucky understood and he got a paper for him.

He saw the man desperately breathing and writing, he managed to write a K.

“Karpov?” Bucky asked. “Do you know where he is?”

However Jack continued writing an I, followed by an L. 

No, he couldn’t be writing what he thought. 

But Jack continued to write until the full message said: KIL ME.

Bucky looked back up to Jack’s pleading eyes before the man turned to the machine. Bucky felt his gut clench and his heart almost stop as he shook his head.

“No,” he gasped. “I can’t.”

Jack huffed an incoherent plea, but that was just something Bucky couldn’t do. He couldn’t do that to this man, not even out of the mercy Jack sought. 

“No,” Bucky stated. “I’m not doing that.”

He ripped the paper away and hid it, ignoring Jack’s pleas.

“You’ve upset him!” his mother exclaimed, stepping into the room as Steve followed. She put a tray of tea on a table then kneeled before her son. 

She whispered reassurances to Jack who continued to plead to him. 

“I’m sorry,” Bucky mouthed. 

It was all he could do.

After that he hurried toward Steve, whispering, “Let’s go.”

Steve glanced toward him in surprise, but didn’t follow. He turned back toward the woman and her son, the man sobbed as his mother kissed his hand and prayed under her breath. He licked his lips as he held the trading cards the woman had given him to sign. He found a pen nearby and quickly signed one of them before placing them on a piece of furniture. When he turned back he saw Jack’s eyes on him, pleading, as tears rolled down his eyes. Steve knew that expression well enough. 

The expression of someone who wanted to die.

He couldn’t help him with that, no matter how much the man wanted it. It just wasn’t something he could do, so he left to join Bucky, feeling a cold grip inside his chest as Jack huffed loud sobs after him.

So this was how far Karpov would go to break someone. Now Steve had yet a better picture of that monster and more reason to hate him.

~~~~~

T’Challa wouldn’t say he felt better when he woke up, truthfully he wasn’t so sure he would _ever_ feel better again, but he felt rested, at least as much as he could. When he sat up he stretched his arms, feeling something crack before he looked around the room. He smiled when he saw Aneka lying on the couch chair a little further away from his bed, and he actually chuckled when he saw the amount of pillows and blankets over and around her. She had refused to leave his side and so Barton and Romanoff had taken it upon themselves to ensure she was comfortable. 

He slowly stood up and walked out of his room, it was already eight at night; he had slept a good twenty four hours. He stepped quietly through the halls, he didn’t want to bother anyone at the moment, so he made his way to the training room as quietly as possible.

He needed distractions; with the memory still fresh in his mind and the pain glaringly present. It was alright, he could do this; sometimes pain was something he had to learn to walk with, just like his father taught him.

_“But Baba, it hurts!” he cried._

When he was a child he had injured his leg while playing in the inner garden, the place was large and no one but the royal family was allowed in this particular garden, so he still had to walk a bit in order to be carried by the guards to a medic.

_“I know child,” his father whispered as he helped him step. “But my bones aren’t feeling so good today, I need your help as well.”_

_“But it really hurts!”_

_“I’m sorry child but there are pains that sometimes you must learn to walk with.”_

It wasn’t easy. If he was honest, he just wanted to lie in bed and pretend the world outside didn’t exist, he wanted to cry himself to sleep and never have to get up, he just wanted to wallow in his grief. 

But even as he desperately wanted to rest and never stop, Sam’s words kept resonating in his mind: _do it for them._

He had to do it for them, because he wasn’t the only one affected. He couldn’t imagine what they were going through, they would no doubt stand strong before the world, but once they were behind closed doors they would surely break. It wasn’t fair that he wasn’t there for them; whatever he had done they didn’t deserve to be suffering. 

Who knew? Perhaps they didn’t want him, but that would be something he would find out for himself. He would fight to be with them again, because they didn’t deserve this. Whatever happened to him didn’t matter, _they_ didn’t deserve to suffer.

He breathed deeply as he entered the training room, he made his way toward a punching bag and immediately attacked, uncaring if his hands weren’t bandaged, he just needed to release some steam. 

He kept punching the bag for so long, unaware that his hands were getting numb. He just needed to distract himself, needed to stop thinking about this, to forget what was done to him. He just wanted to forget it so much, to deny this happened to him. 

He was the prince of Wakanda, how could this have happened to him? Why wasn’t he strong enough? He should’ve been able to fight more! This wasn’t supposed to happen to him! Why did he still keep remembering it?

He could feel the man’s hands on him, whispering in his ear.

No, he needed to forget, otherwise he couldn’t keep going. He had to forget it, but he couldn’t.

_“Once they take you, you know what to do,” the man said before licking his ear. “You’ll help me find my James.”_

_He remembered shooting his father._

Before he knew it, he was on his knees, gasping desperately for breath, his body trembling all over. No, he needed to keep going; he had to ignore his feelings. 

“It doesn’t happen overnight.”

He jumped when he heard the voice and found Sam only a few feet away. He continued gasping, letting out a groan as well. He was screwed if he hadn’t even noticed Sam entering. 

“I just need to train, I should be fine.”

“Really?” Sam scoffed in amusement. “You think you’re gonna be fine after throwing a few punches at a sandbag?”

T’Challa looked up, trying to give the man a glare but was too tired to do anything else but sit on the ground, trying to even out his breaths.

Sam smiled and shook his head while going over to him, “And I thought _Bucky_ was the dumbass...yeah, no, he still is.”

Once near him he offered T’Challa his hand, T’Challa stared at it for a moment before grasping it and letting Sam help him up.

“You can’t rush it,” Sam said. “It takes time and energy, which you don’t have. I know yesterday you felt like you could get through this, but the feeling wore out and now…let me guess, you just want to forget it ever happened.”

T’Challa bit his lip and refused to meet Sam’s eyes.

“I know the feeling,” Sam sighed. “And that’s a step backwards, it happens, don’t blame yourself. But you can’t forget it, there’s no forgetting, there’s only moving forward.”

“…You seem to know a lot about the process of healing.”

“I know the theory,” Sam shrugged. “Applying theory in practice is a little more difficult, and frankly trying to ignore your feelings towards it is just going to make it worse, it’s tempting but you can’t do that.”

“…And how do you stop?”

Sam paused, taking a deep breath, “Not sure, sometimes I think about the good stuff, from before, it helps.”

“…I just want to forget, I want to go back to being the person I used to be, not this-this… _broken_ puppet.”

Sam said nothing for bit, he quietly sat on the floor then tapped the place in front of him for T’Challa to do the same. The man gave him helpless stare before sighing and sitting down, waiting for something he didn’t know of.

“I’m going to be honest with you. You’re not going to go back to who you were, believe me I’ve tried. These things change you, but I promise you, this doesn’t make you any less than what you are.”

T’Challa sighed, not sure if he could believe it but glad that he could count on Sam not to.

“It’s just…I’m the Prince of Wakanda, I’m considered one of the greatest warriors in the world, I just…I feel like this is not something that should’ve happened to _me_.”

“…That’s white people talk.”

That managed to earn a laugh from T’Challa.

“I mean, you’re the Strong Black Man, you’re not _supposed_ to be the victim,” Sam said with a bitter smile. “I know the feeling.”

T’Challa took a deep breath through his nose, “I feel like crap.”

“Yeah I know _that_ feeling too.”

“It’s like, when you think you can take on the world after horrible depression and then a while later you feel like crap again?” T’Challa asked.

Sam chuckled, “Yeah, totally know it.”

“Well that’s me right now,” T’Challa smiled bitterly. “I feel like crap and yesterday I thought I could do it.”

“It’ll happen,” they turned to find Aneka entering the room. “The only thing left for you to do is to keep trying.”

T’Challa smiled in gratitude at her, so relieved to have his long life friend as his support.

“So,” Aneka began sitting down with them. “We could train, I know that always makes you feel…better.”

T’Challa smiled, noting that she refused to say it would make him feel _good_ and he felt glad for that. He was about to reply when Sam’s phone beeped.

“Hey, now that you mention it, if you like fighting, I got something you might find interesting.”

T’Challa furrowed his brow in questioning; feeling curious for what Sam could have in mind.

Sam only smirked, “There’s this white trash at my place I need to take out.”

T’Challa and Aneka were _definitely_ interested.

~~~~~

They made it back to Bucky’s apartment by nightfall where Bucky took a quick shower and later allowed Steve the same.

“It’s a Baxter hemodialysis machine,” Steve heard Bucky as he exited the bathroom. “Serial number is JX376F…don’t you have someone in case of emergencies? …Only _one_ person? …Fine have them give me a call at this number later…Thank you, bye. Fucking shitty service!”

Steve stepped out of the bathroom and found Bucky absentmindedly drying his hair on the bed, his gaze faraway and his mind probably on Denton. He still remembered the look on the man, so Bucky probably did as well. 

Steve had no personal feelings in regards to this, at least not in the way Bucky did, which is why he couldn’t imagine what was going through his head.

“You okay?” Steve asked, sitting in front of him.

Bucky eyed him warily, unsure of whether to talk to this man who was still basically a stranger to him, but he realized Steve wasn’t prying, he only offered Bucky his support.

He bit his lip, silently debating on what to say. He could just tell him to stuff it, but on the other hand he desperately wanted to talk to someone.

“In Judaism we don’t believe in the Devil,” he began, feeling vulnerable but somehow trusting Steve with this. “We believe in HaSatan. He isn’t evil, on the contrary, everything he does is because God wanted it, my mother used to tell us that he tempts humans because God wants to test our faith, so technically everything is still God’s doing." 

Bucky smiled at the memories of his mother putting him to bed at night with those stories, "She would tell us he was still God’s angel and we had nothing to fear from him." Suddenly the memories were no longer warm and sweet, they were cold and bitter, "…But I see now that’s a whole lot of bull.”

Steve said nothing, being Irish Catholic himself he had no right to say anything. 

He allowed Bucky to continue and for that Bucky felt relieved and strong enough to do so.

“I didn’t believe in the Devil until I met Karpov,” Bucky gulped, remembering the first time he met that man. “I remember I used to recite prayers before meeting him, I’d do it every night…then one day I felt his control, it was like I was a puppet, I could see and feel what was happening but…I couldn’t do anything." He shivered at the horrible memory of Karpov controlling him for the first time, and remembering how his horror hadn't faded even after he was away from him, "...When I broke free I wanted to recite the Birkhat HaGomel, it’s supposed to be recited when you’ve been freed from captivity, but I just couldn’t bring myself to do it…It’s hard to believe God sent an angel to do this to me, to Jack, to T’Challa.”

“…I’m sorry,” Steve muttered, reaching a hand out toward Bucky and began to rub it when the other didn’t pull back. “I wish you could still have your faith, I wish none of this had happened.”

Bucky took a deep breath, enjoying how the touch soothed him, “…I just wanted to believe he was dead,” he admitted. “I wanted to believe I was finally free…but now he’s screwing up someone else’s life, after screwing up mine and so many others.”

Steve bit his lip unknowing what to do or say to that, he so desperately wanted to offer Bucky the comfort he needed but he wasn’t sure he knew what that was. 

But maybe he could do something else.

He released Bucky’s hand and grabbed his phone, dialing Fury.

“Hey Fury,” he said after a few minutes. “I need a favor, there’s a man named Jack Denton who was denied worker’s compensation, I’d like you to see if you can fix that.”

Bucky gazed at him with surprise and dare he say it, awe.

“…It’s not important, I just need that favor, can you do it? …Alright, thanks I owe you one.”

He hung up and turned back to Bucky with a small smile, “Despite the serum, despite being the hero of the nation, I really can’t do much, and frankly neither can you.”

Bucky knew that, and it pissed him off.

“All we can do is try to fix what we can, that’s what we need to do now, for T’Challa, for Jack…for you.”

“…What if I’m not worth it Steve?”

Steve smiled in reassurance, “…We’ll see about that, at least you will, I already have.”

Bucky couldn’t help a small smile when he saw the sincerity in Steve’s eyes.

“How are you so incredibly positive?”

Steve shrugged, “I believe in the goodness of people.”

“That could be considered naïve.”

“So I’ve been told…but I don’t want to stop believing in people like you, and I’m not going to quit on you.”

Bucky wouldn’t say it, but those words made his heart flutter and he felt his cheeks heat up. Shit, why the hell was he acting like this? He didn’t know why he was so nervous. Was it because Steve believed in him, was it the way he looked into his eyes and inched closer? He had no idea, but despite his nervousness he inched closer as well.

Their heads tilted slightly and inched ever slowly, their lips so close they could feel each other’s breaths. Steve’s hands went to caress Bucky’s hair as they intertwined their fingers. Their eyes closed, their lips were just a hair away from touching.

And then Steve’s phone rang.

The two parted while clearing their throats, nervously rubbing their necks while Steve went to answer the phone, he had to clear his throat again to speak, “Yes.”

“Steve we have a problem!” Rhodey exclaimed. “T’Challa’s gone!”

“What?!” Steve yelled.

“Wilson came yesterday and now they’re both gone, so is Aneka.”

Steve’s head rattled with the news turning to Bucky for help, “T’Challa’s gone, he was with Sam and Aneka.”

Bucky immediately went to call Sam.

“Okay if Aneka’s gone with him then he should be okay, but still did he say anything or-.”

“Are you out of your fucking mind?!” Bucky yelled into his own phone.

“...Just a sec,” Steve muttered in confusion.

“How in the hell are you-? …No I don’t want to hear it you…no, no, no, don’t hang up! …Samuel Thomas Wilson don’t you dare hang up the-!”

Steve was sure Sam hung up.

“...Phone!” Bucky growled.

“Do we know where they are?” Steve asked tentatively, noticing Bucky going red with anger.

“…Yeah,” he sighed. “But you might not like it.”

“Rhodey we know where they are, sit tight, I’ll call you if we need anything.”

“Alright.”

“Where are they?” Steve asked once he hung up.

“…Stopping a robbery,” he muttered.

Steve frowned in confusion, that’s when he heard a crash below.

“Downstairs,” Bucky finished.

He gave Bucky a questioning glance but Bucky only shrugged and darted downstairs, a confused Steve running behind him.

Once they made it downstairs and to the front of the bar they stopped in time before a man crashed through the window in front of them. 

The two frowned in confusion at the man then at each other before they went into the bar. They realized their presence hadn’t been needed, neither was Sam’s or Aneka’s by the looks of it.

“Nothing like Wakanda but I do what I can,” Sam calmly said as he handed Aneka a drink, completely ignoring T’Challa beating up four dudes.

“It’s actually better than Stark’s,” Aneka commented, she too was ignoring the commotion.

Steve and Bucky couldn’t help but gawk at the two, then at T’Challa.

The prince avoided a bat swing, grasped the bat, turned around and punched another man, then yanked the bat away, spun and kicked the man in the chest and sent him flying. Bucky and Steve had to step away before the man hit them. There were now three of them and T’Challa seemed anxious for them to do anything.

One man took a swing but T’Challa blocked and punched him in the chest repeatedly, knocking him back, he avoided a knife, grasped the man’s arm and twisted until it snapped, he blocked a third man’s punch with a kick and shielded himself with the man he had by the arm. He then jumped over the man he grabbed and kicked the next one unconscious; he knocked out the one he was holding and blocked a punch from the remaining man and flipped him over his shoulder toward another window. 

Once he was done he finally breathed heavily, his energy spent now that he worked up a good sweat. 

On another occasion Bucky would’ve stopped to be impressed by the events but right now he was just pissed, mostly at Sam and Aneka.

“What the hell?!” Bucky exclaimed to the two while Aneka enjoyed her drinks and Sam some nuts he kept under the counter.

“My alarm system detected people trying to break in, rather than call the police we thought we should come,” Sam explained.

“For what?!” 

“For T’Challa to get some air and do some exercise,” Aneka answered. 

“ _Exercise_?! What were you thinking?!” Bucky yelled.

“I was thinking he needed a good coping method,” Aneka shrugged.

“And I was thinking stopping some robbers would do the trick,” Sam shrugged as well.

“This is in no way a _good_ coping method, this is a reckless and dangerous coping method that no one should try, I don’t care how badass Wakandan fighters are!” After that last part he glared at Aneka.

“…It’s a good way to de-stress,” she shrugged.

Bucky groaned, “Steve, help me out here!”

Steve was silent, only eyeing T’Challa with curiosity. There was glint in his eyes, he had seen it all throughout the fight, he was also taking several deep breaths, his muscles seemed more relaxed, and there was the slightest hint of a smile on his face.

Truthfully T’Challa looked more alive, after everything T’Challa actually looked _alive_.

“Did it make you feel better?” Steve finally asked.

“That is _not_ helping me out!” Bucky complained but Steve ignored him.

T’Challa was surprised by the question, still gasping for breath he replied, “I don’t know if I’ll ever feel better, but I’m not constantly wishing I were dead anymore…that’s a start right?”

Steve smiled and reached out to hug T’Challa who hugged back, both patting each other on the back.

“I’m sorry,” Steve whispered. “But we’re going to help you, I promise.”

T’Challa smiled gratefully, “Thank you…thank you for being here for me.”

“Anytime,” Steve said, more than happy to help someone he cared about.

Bucky watched the exchange and pointedly avoided looking at Sam, it’s not that he wanted to; he just couldn’t be near Sam anymore…right?

“Get your ass over here!” Sam called.

That just made Bucky smirk in amusement and go over to him, giving him a hug himself. 

Who was he kidding? He could never stay away from Sam, either out of responsibility or because he just loved the guy too much.

“You’re an asshole,” Sam muttered. “But you’re _my_ asshole.”

Bucky rolled his eyes, but more than happy to be okay with Sam.

“Shut up and pour me a drink,” Bucky muttered, sitting down at the bar next to Aneka, soon joined by Steve and T’Challa.

Steve called the rest of the Avengers and let them know where T’Challa and Aneka were and that they were safe. After getting a few drinks Steve suggested they go to back to the tower, he disliked having to confine T’Challa but it was safer for him not to be out in public. 

“I’m going to have to take some of your bottles,” T’Challa commented.

“Doesn’t Stark have any?”

“Yes, he believes he has a fine taste for liquor but he doesn’t, and as someone accustomed to Wakandan drinks I refuse to drink anything but the best of American.”

Steve laughed at that; Tony would lose it if he heard that, that or he would mope on Rhodey’s shoulder.

“We should each sneak something in, Aneka you take the whisky, Bucky you take the-,” he stopped when he noticed Bucky was gone. 

“He texted me,” Sam said with an amused smile. “He says: gone, leaving.”

“I still have the tracer on him,” Aneka said.

Steve rolled his eyes, “Why is he so adamant on going off on his own?”

“He probably doesn’t want to risk anyone else,” Sam shrugged.

Steve rolled his eyes, “How is he so stubborn?”

“Welcome to my nightmare,” Sam said patting him on the shoulder.

“Alright, you guys should head toward the tower, I’ll find him and go meet you,” Steve said as he went to follow Bucky’s trail.

“Steve,” T’Challa called. 

Steve waited for T’Challa to speak but the man seemed almost afraid to do so, he wrapped his arms around himself and avoided his gaze as he bit his lip; it hadn’t occurred to Steve that he knew what he was doing with Bucky.

“I’ll be careful,” Steve assured with a smile. 

T’Challa was nowhere near assured, but he trusted Steve with his life. He would trust him to do this without risking himself too much. 

“Hey Steve,” this time it was Sam who got his attention. “I need you to give him something when he gets back.”

~~~~~~

Getting away from Steve was probably a dick move but Bucky was just full of those so one more wouldn’t hurt. He got a message call from the manufacturer who gave him the name for the person who released the machine, safe to say he didn’t want Steve tagging along. He knew the guy was probably tracking him, or one of his friends was, but with his motorcycle he could definitely reach the location faster. He still had time, the man was a professor at a local community college, Dr. Bruce Banner, and his last class ended at 11 PM. By the time Steve reached him Bucky could have what he needed, that or he could be in a lot of trouble. For that Steve wasn’t accompanying him.

When he reached the building, he realized there wasn’t much about it, especially not for someone like Banner. He managed to find the man’s classroom where he was explaining to the class something about test scores that Bucky paid no attention to, instead he sat and waited for the class to end. 

Suddenly Banner made eye contact with him and paused, he seemed visibly shaken and nervous. Bucky raised a questioning eyebrow at him, but he knew what was going on, which is why he reacted so quickly when Banner ran through a door at the side. 

Bucky chased after him, ignoring the startled whispering from the students, and followed him through another classroom, then the hallways where Banner kept pushing people out of his way; he was desperate. Bucky kept following him down some stairs until finally they reached a basement. Here Bucky stopped, he already checked the buildings design and knew there was no way out for Banner, but still he wanted to be cautious. 

“Dr. Banner,” he called stepping through the place with slow steps. “I know you think I’m here to hurt you, but I’m not. You don’t even know me…look you used to work at the best medical research centers in the country and now you’re dissecting frogs with undergrads. So you either wanted less work hours or you’re hiding. Why?”

He kept walking, looking around the place from wherever the man could try and do something stupid from. He didn’t know if Banner was still being controlled but he didn’t want to risk it.

“Is he here?” he heard the man say.

He turned to a corner where he could see the man’s shadow.

“Who Karpov?” Bucky asked, his tone accusing. “He’s dead according to the death certificate _you_ helped forge.”

“Is he with you?” Bruce asked, fear evident in his voice.

“Why would he?”

“He had pictures of you…he was obsessed.”

Bucky pursed his lips then stated, “He’s not here.”

Slowly the man stepped out of the shadows, cautious and fearful, but also guilty.

“You did a surgery on the EMT, Jack Denton,” Bucky continued.

“No, he _made_ me.”

“I know,” Bucky assured. “Why? What shape was he in? How badly was he hurt?”

Bruce sighed heavily, his arms fidgeting, “One of his kidneys got destroyed in the accident, the other started to break down, it’s known as crush syndrome. I told Karpov that he could survive with one kidney, but he said he wanted to be _whole_ again.”

“And Jack happened to be a match.”

“Any kidney can work temporarily. He’ll have to main someone else in a couple of years.”

Bucky shook his head, that couldn’t be all, that couldn’t be the extent of Karpov’s shape, “No other injuries, any weaknesses.”

“…I’ve never seen such strong will!” Bruce blurted. “Ten hours of surgery and Karpov watched me the entire time.”

“He was _awake_? No anesthesia?”

“He did the whole thing with an epidural, he refused to be put under.”

“He’s a lot of things but a masochist isn’t one of them, he didn’t want to be unconscious…but he _sleeps_.”

“It’s different, surgical anesthesia like Propofol Sufentanil, it shuts down different functions of the brain.”

Bucky’s eyes widened in realization, “That’s it! That’s his weakness!”

He quickly grabbed his cellphone and sent a quick text to Steve to wait outside with a ride from Stark, then he dialed Fury. 

“Coulson get me Fury, right away,” Bucky said on the phone then turned to Bruce. “He’s the head of SHIELD, you’re going to tell him what happened.”

“No!” Bruce exclaimed, eyes wide and began to step away but Bucky held him fast.

“Yes! What exactly do you have to lose?!”

Bruce seemed to be debating this, but his answer was one Bucky didn’t need him to say for him to know, “My _mind_.”

“Hello?” Fury said on the line.

Bucky exhaled, looking at Banner in apology, “This is happening, you’re going to start helping people again, starting with me.”

“Barnes? Is that you?” Fury called.

“Fury, meet Dr. Banner,” he said to the phone before handing it over to Bruce. “Start at the beginning.”

Banner reluctantly took the phone and started telling his story. 

~~~~~

Steve waited for Bucky to emerge, basically dragging another man with him. He didn’t ask what happened; he figured Bucky would explain later. He watched as Bucky placed the man in the car to go to Stark tower, Steve was almost tempted to go along but he couldn’t leave Bucky, especially not when he was visibly shaken. He followed Bucky on his own motorcycle, until they made it back to Bucky’s place.

“You don’t have to be here,” Bucky said once they were inside.

“I know,” Steve spoke softly. “I just don’t want you to be alone.”

Bucky ignored his words, preferring to go and drink some beer. Steve let him, no matter how much he wished Bucky would stop trying to drown his problems with alcohol. Still he couldn’t do much, save give him what Sam told him to.

“Hey Sam told me to give this to you,” he said going over to the living room and pulling out a fragile package. 

Bucky eyed it curiously and took it from Steve, gently prying the wrapping off to reveal the Canary Investigations logo for his door. He couldn’t help but smile with pure joy. He didn’t deserve Sam, not one bit.

“Mind if I make a phone call?” he asked Steve.

“I’ll go fix something in the kitchen,” Steve assured.

Bucky smiled in thanks.

It took a few rings before Sam answered, “The font logo was different.”

“I know, this one looks better, cause’ I chose it,” Sam replied, and gosh Bucky could _hear_ that smirk on his face.

“Look I-.”

“I don’t need your protection Barnes, I got my own back now.”

“…Well in that case, we should go out for lunch sometime.”

“Come to the tower, Stark’s got great food here and it’s _free_.” 

“Done.”

“But I do want to say this: mention Rumlow again and I swear I will cut your nuts off.”

“Won’t happen again.”

Bucky wasn’t joking, because he’d be an idiot if he didn’t believe Sam.

“Good…you wanna have sex tomorrow?”

“Hell yeah, I miss your pretty little tuchus,” Bucky smiled. “Maybe I’ll finger you with my left hand.”

“Do you actually finger asses with it?”

“No, but I’ve thought about it.”

“Don’t, it’s actually very unsanitary.” 

Bucky rolled his eyes, though admittedly Sam was right. 

“I’ll be waiting, good night.”

“Night.” 

Bucky sighed and smiled at the logo. Who was he kidding? He couldn’t keep away from Sam, whether it was out of guilt or loyalty, he just couldn’t. He didn’t mind though, he was the one thing in his life that wasn’t complete shit. Though now that he smelled something good, he could argue he was _one_ of the things in his life that wasn’t complete shit.

He turned back toward Steve who came in carrying a cup of hot chocolate, since when did he have chocolate?

“You need to stop drinking so much alcohol,” Steve scolded handing him the cup.

Bucky took it gratefully and raised it to Steve who did so as well before they drank the whole thing. Gosh that was delicious! Sweet and warm; maybe switching chocolate for alcohol wasn't such a bad idea. 

“That’s pretty good, I’m just glad it still had time before it expired,” Steve commented, “by the way there’s rat shit in your cupboards.”

Bucky chuckled sitting on the desk, soon joined by Steve. Bucky’s hand wandered toward Steve’s until Steve reached out and held it. 

It felt so nice to just sit with this man drinking chocolate, with a man that may not know him but still treated him with kindness. It might not last but he would enjoy it while it did.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've definitely been where T'Challa's been when it comes to depression. 
> 
> Next chapter might include a sex scene, not sure if between Sam and Bucky or Steve and Bucky, or maybe all three idk.


End file.
